Nature paper demonstrates a thermodynamically favoured Scaffolded DNA Computer running 10 programs
chaitjo · x · 2026-09-20
An open-access Nature paper, A thermodynamically favoured molecular computer by Tristan Stérin, Constantine Glen Evans, Damien Woods and colleagues, shows computation can be embedded in a system relaxing toward a thermodynamically favoured equilibrium state, avoiding the energetically costly kinetic error control (proofreading, redundancy) that both biology and conventional computing rely on.
- The team built a programmable Scaffolded DNA Computer (SDC) by engineering its energy landscape
- They demonstrated 10 programs, including multiply-by-3, divide-by-2, 8-bit parity detection, and addition
It's billed as a first physical implementation of thermodynamically favoured computation in a programmable medium.
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