Remember the episode In Which We Meet Mr. Jones, where the DNA analysis of the genetically engineered heart parasite on Loeb’s heart has a repeating sequence of ZFT?
Remember the episode The Bishop Revival, where the molecular structure of the toxin used by Hoffman has the seahorse signature of Robert Bishop?
Well, I’ve found this article in NewScientist today – Cryptic poetry written in a microbe’s DNA, which reminded me of the two episodes I listed up there.
Christian Bök has three degrees in English, did a crash course on the science of molecular biology… now doing a project of what he called “The Xenotext Experiment”. Basically, what he intends to do is to translate his original poem into DNA sequence, insert this to the microbe Deinococcus radiodurans, then as a response to the “inserted text” the bacteria would produce protein. If you ask why protein, it is because of the central dogma of molecular biology – DNA transcribes to RNA then RNA translates to protein.
And I quote:
It’s a very short poem; a very masculine assertion about the aesthetic creation of life. The organism reads the poem, and writes in response a very melancholy, feminine – almost surreal – poem about the aesthetic of the loss of life. They’re in dialogue with each other.
What do you think?
This article just proves one thing – you can be anyone and still can do some great science! Keep it nerdy!
That is a really cool idea and a wonderful combination of science and metaphysics. Wow, seriously, being a failed writer myself, I can’t imagine what it must be like to literally have your work come to life. This is playing god in the best way possible. The best thing I could come up with is to one day have my poems shot into space.
(Bishop’s seahorse signature also reminds me of Blade Runner, where extinct animals are genetically engineered (or should I say replicated) with serial numbers embedded in their DNA and their cells.)