Imagine a computer constructed of cells with a type of DNA coding which can identify defects and repair them without human intervention. Until now, this has been the stuff of pure science fiction, and what made the robots in the Terminator films so robust and fantastical on the big screen. That a machine could regenerate.

Now it’s no longer science fiction, because this is essentially what a DTU team has created the foundation for. The invention has been named eDNA – or electronic DNA.

  Terminator look-alike

Armed with zeros, ones, mathematical models and a good dose of patience, Jan Madsen and the two PhD students Pascal Schleuniger and Michael Reibel Boesen have spent the past three years or so working on the concept of eDNA. The result of their ideas and hard work is now standing in an office at DTU Informatics.

However, even thought the result is, to put it crudely, a cloning between a human’s abilities and a computer, readers will be disappointed to hear that it does not in any way resemble Arnold Schwarzenegger from the Terminator films. In fact, the eDNA computer looks no different to a completely ordinary computer on the outside, but inside it is almost as revolutionary as the Terminator robots. The computer is built up of many small cells, much like humans, explains John Madsen:

„Basically, all the computer’s cells can be regarded as stem cells; in other words they have not yet been assigned a specific task. When the eDNA computer needs to perform a particular task, the task is coded in a sequence similar to the DNA in a human cell. In this way, an organism develops from the computer’s cells, and it is this that makes the computer – almost – immortal.“

The point is that, because of all the extra cells, i.e. the stem cells which have not been assigned a task, the self-repairing computer can tolerate more defects before it ‘dies’. And this is what makes the technology extremely interesting for NASA, which has adapted the project for future space missions.

eDNA helping to find life

When NASA launches a satellite into space, the unmanned craft and everything in it is subjected to some of the most inhospitable conditions imaginable. The shakes and vibrations from the launch and during the journey into the cosmos can disable ordinary computers – not to mention the extreme temperatures. When the satellite reaches its destination, which is often 800 km above the Earth’s surface, its equipment has to withstand radioactive solar radiation which is so powerful that it can easily affect the functioning of a chip or a program in one of the on-board computers.

Therefore it wasn’t long before NASA invited the research team from DTU Informatics inside the thick and secure walls of its establishment once they heard about the eDNA computer’s properties:

„Robustness and security are two of NASA’s key focus areas. My mission is to convince NASA that eDNA can make a satellite and the information it gathers and transmits back to Earth faster and more reliable,“ says PhD student Michael Reibel Boesen.

For the past three months, Michael Reibel Boesen has been permanently based in the heart of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA’s primary technology centre in California. On the 27-year-old researcher’s desk sits a true copy of the spectrometer which NASA uses when looking for extraterrestrial life, and it is Michael Reibel Boesen’s job to implement eDNA in the spectrometer. „It’s a boyhood dream come true! Helping to design the technology which can possibly find out whether there is life on Mars is hugely exciting – it is the voyage of discovery of our time,“ says an enthusiastic Michael Reibel Boesen.

eDNA is the technology that enables a computer to regenerate

according to the same principle as humans. Michael Reibel Boesen

has completed his work at NASA’s primary technology centre

in California.

Gazing into the crystal ball

Back in Denmark at Richard Petersens Plads, Professor Jan Madsen is crossing his fingers that Michael Reibel Boesen returns home with good results – because if the research team can convince NASA of the self-repairing computer’s abilities, it will only be a question of time before we are all equipped with computers which never collapse:

„We are living in a world where everyone wants robustness, not just within the medical field and at NASA’s main facility, but also ordinary computer users like you and I. It is, of course, my dream – and my hope – that eDNA will come to be used by many more people,“ concludes Jan Madsen with a modest smile.