A Robust and Efficient DNA Storage Architecture Based on Modulation Encoding and Decoding.

Area of Science:

• Biotechnology
• Data Storage
• Bioinformatics

Background:

• Synthetic DNA is a promising medium for digital data storage.
• Insertion-deletion-substitution (IDS) errors in sequenced DNA reads pose a significant challenge for reliable data recovery.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose a new DNA storage architecture using modulation techniques to address IDS errors.
• To improve the reliability and robustness of data recovery from synthetic DNA.

Main Methods:

• Modulating binary data into DNA sequences with consistent AT/GC patterns.
• Utilizing modulation signals as prior information for error detection and correction.
• Encoding sequences to meet biological constraints like balanced GC content and avoiding homopolymers.

Main Results:

• Demonstrated compliance with biological encoding constraints (balanced GC content, no homopolymers).
• Achieved highly efficient and robust modulation decoding, correcting up to 40% of errors.
• Showcased robustness against imperfect clustering reconstruction common in practical applications.

Conclusions:

• The proposed modulation encoding offers a robust solution for DNA data storage, effectively mitigating IDS errors.
• Despite a logical density of 1.0 bits/nt, the high error correction capability supports the development of cost-effective synthetic DNA technologies.
• This architecture has the potential to accelerate the adoption of large-scale DNA data storage applications.