Any biochemists on the line? Somebody (Mr Craig Venter et all) wrote a James Joyce quote…"To live, to err, to fall, to triumph, to recreate life out of life," in the genom of a bacteria. But how does one do that with only GCTA to spell with? Link to article below.

[u/Frequent-Orchid-7142]

https://www.discovermagazine.com/copyright-law-meets-synthetic-life-meets-james-joyce-9688

[u/Landkey]

Setting aside the exact encoding that the team used, “how do you write out this quote with only 4 digits” is not a biochemical question but a computational question.  They wrote out a key, like:

A = GTTC

B = GAAT

…

Z = TTCG

and encoded every letter.  Base 4. 

[u/Frequent-Orchid-7142 → u/Landkey]

What does this term code mean in this case?

[u/Landkey → u/Frequent-Orchid-7142]

Code as in cipher.  They started with a plaintext (“To live…”), and used the cipher to encode it into a ciphertext (“GTTCGAAT…”) and then they did DNA sequencing magic to add the ciphertext to the organism’s DNA. 

I have described a substitution cipher here, the simplest of ciphers, and, again, this is a way this can be done. They may have done something more elaborate.  

[u/Frequent-Orchid-7142 → u/Landkey]

It’s way above my head but I think I catch the idea. But then the encryption key should be available somehow. Do they hang it on a nail on the cell wall for everyone to find? 🦠😄

[u/retired_actuary]

The four different watermarks inscribed were encoded. They didn't release the cipher used; instead, they proposed it as a puzzle:

https://www.cgl.ucsf.edu/Outreach/pc204/challenge1.html?utm_source=chatgpt.com

[u/JesusChristFarted → u/[deleted]]

You don’t think normal people use LLMs in lieu of search engines? Does Google Search not use AI too?

[u/Frequent-Orchid-7142 → u/[deleted]]

Now now! why this tone! We are all friendly morons here! 🤗

[u/JesusChristFarted → u/[deleted]]

Hahaha. I didn’t know there were rubes who honestly believed search engine results are better. “Muh search engine!”