[1]. For this reason, time capsules are typically assembled with
the intention that they will someday be opened. The Crypt of
Civilization, constructed a Oglethorpe University in 1936 is
considered to be the first modern time capsule, and is scheduled to
be opened in the year 8113
[2]. 6,000 years is quite a while, but
the Crypt has been designed to withstand the test of time. However,
the same cannot be said for many other time capsules. Several
preservation issues must be addressed when constructing a time
capsule. Many time capsules are destroyed by groundwater, or simply
lost because their location is forgotten. The choice of media used
to preserve time capsule information is crucial, if it is meant to
be retrieved in the future. Technology advances at a rapid pace,
quickly becoming obsolete, while electronic and magnetic storage
media suffer from deterioration after just a few decades,
illustrating some of the preservation issues that must be taken
into account. For instance, while disk drives capable of reading 5
1⁄4 inch floppy disks were commonly used before the turn of the
21st century, you would be hard pressed to find one today. In this
respect, DNA presents and excellent medium for storage of
information meant for the distant future; as long as there is
intelligent DNA-based life, there will be a reason to study DNA. As
such, technologies for manipulating DNA can be expected to exist in
the future.
A time capsule holding information encoded in DNA can serve as
more than just a message to the future. Given it’s density,
durability and low energy requirements, DNA-based time capsules can
be used to preserve human knowledge for future civilizations or
extraterrestrial visitors, in case of an Extinction Level Event
that wipes out our society. The KEO space time capsule, set to
launch some time in 2017, is meant to carry a compendium of current
human knowledge, and is designed to re-enter Earth’s atmosphere in
50,000 years. Although 50 millennia seems like a long time to us,
it is a blink of an eye from cosmological and evolutionary
perspectives. Information preserved in DNA can potentially last for
millions of years [3], and therefore may someday be discovered by a
completely new humanoid species. The Voyager Golden Records,
launched aboard the Voyager space probes in 1977 are another
example of time capsules in space. These phonograph records contain
115 images and almost 1.5 hours of sounds chosen to portray life on
Earth. These records will never be seen by human eyes again, as
they are over 2.02×1010 km away, and heading away from Earth at a
speed of about 62,100 km per hour. Instead, they are meant for an
extraterrestrial audience. Although expected to last for millions
of years, these records represent a proverbial drop in an ocean of
human knowledge. A DNA-based archive included in such a time
capsule could represent a much more detailed snapshot of our
civilization.
“This is a present from a small, distant world, a token
of our sounds, our science, our images, our music, our thoughts and
our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live
into yours.” - U.S. President Jimmy
Carter
“Launching of this 'bottle' into the cosmic 'ocean'
says something very hopeful about life on this planet."
- Carl Sagan
References
- [1] Eternal Memory: Long-Duration Storage Concepts for Space
66th International Astronautical Congress, Jerusalem, Israel. ©2015
by M Guzman, A Hein and C Welch.
- [2] Crypt
of Civilization Paul Stephen Hudson, Georgia State University
Perimeter College, 04/01/2003
- [3] Isolation of a 250 million-year-old halotolerant bacterium
from a primary salt crystal Nature 407, 897-900 (19 October 2000) |
doi:10.1038/35038060
