Raphael Kim
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Stories on microbes, DNA & AI 🦠🧬 🤖 Sign up to my newsletter for Biodesign & Sustainable Design stories: https://www.biodesign.academy/subscribe
Stories (8)
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What they don’t tell you about digital DNA data storage
A few years back, a TED talk featuring scientist Dina Zielinski caught my attention through a seemingly mundane plastic tube. With a twinkle in her eye, she held it up and proclaimed, “I can fit all movies ever made inside of this tube. If you can’t see it, that’s kind of the point.” What she was referring to wasn’t a magic trick, but a ground-breaking concept: DNA data storage.
By Raphael Kim2 years ago in Futurism
How my moldy scanner exposed an exciting (and troubling) future of Biodigital Convergence
One afternoon, a few years back, an uneasy aroma of musty cheese wafted from an unlikely source in my office — the flatbed scanner. Upon investigation, I discovered a thick, crusty, and moldy residue smeared across its transparent scanning bed, accompanied by an unmistakable odor. But I wasn’t that astonished by this revelation, as it turned out to be a peculiar side-effect resulting from a research project I had conducted a few days earlier.
By Raphael Kim2 years ago in Geeks
Playing Computer Games with… Bacteria?
(NB: I confirm that I own the rights to the content, unless otherwise stated). Picture yourself completely absorbed in a computer game: where you are darting through crumbling urban landscapes, pursued by cordyceps-infected zombies, zapping them with plasma rifles, or engaging in cerebral battles of chess and intricate strategy games. Now, envision this gaming experience where your opponents aren’t merely humans or virtual characters, but rather unconventional (yet very much real and living) entities — such as microscopic bacteria, yeasts, and fungi — adding an entirely different dimension to your gameplay.
By Raphael Kim2 years ago in Gamers
When Computer “Bugs” Become Real
It’s likely that you have come across the term “glitch”, in the context of computer games. They are essentially small coding errors where the algorithm running a video game doesn’t quite function as intended. One of the most famous glitch effects in the gaming world is the Minus World glitch from Super Mario Bros. When a player executes a specific jumping manoeuvre near the end of world 1–2, a slight error in the game’s collision detection algorithm triggers a chain of unintended scenarios. The glitch leads to the loading of an unintended world — the Minus World — and the creation of a visual pathway, like an extra green pipe in the “warp zone,” to access this new world.
By Raphael Kim2 years ago in Geeks
E.coli, the next Raspberry Pi?
Imagine a scenario where — tiny living robots work inside of your body, sensing and delivering life-saving drugs, or deploying them out to hostile environments, from the sea to even outer space, again, sensing and delivering and monitoring various useful things [15,6]. But even more interestingly, imagine if these robots were actually living bacteria, such as E.coli? As far-fetched as this may sound, the reality is probably a little closer than you think. In the realm of IoT, or more precisely, the Internet of Bacterial Things (IoBT), researchers have been making advances in making this into reality.
By Raphael Kim2 years ago in Futurism
Utopian Optics of DNA Data Storage
Recently, as I was browsing through the list of current members of DNA Data Storage Alliance (DDSA)— a collaborative group composed of various entities from academia, industry, and technology sectors that are working to develop and promote the DNA-based archival technology — a company called Imagene caught my attention. Upon closer inspection, the company was involved in an interesting ceremony in France.
By Raphael Kim2 years ago in Critique
Jelly-Scapes
Many of us associate agar jelly with wobbly, sticky and colourful confectionary. Somewhat humble yet essential tool in biotechnology, agar also provides framework, or platform on which micro-organisms like bacteria can grow, move and function, allowing scientists to manipulate microbes in a controlled environment. Aside from current culinary and scientific affiliations, I see an alternative outlook for agar than meets the eye.
By Raphael Kim2 years ago in Education
