General information
Offer title : Post-doc: Environmental footprint of an emerging technology: the case of DNA-based computing (M/F) (H/F)
Reference : UMR8516-ANDEST-005
Number of position : 1
Workplace : VILLENEUVE D ASCQ
Date of publication : 18 June 2025
Type of Contract : Researcher in FTC
Contract Period : 24 months
Expected date of employment : 1 October 2025
Proportion of work : Full Time
Remuneration : Between 2991 € and 4 757 € brutto
Desired level of education : Doctorate
Experience required : 1 to 4 years
Section(s) CN : 52 – Social environments: fundamental to operational
Missions
The aim of the project is to assess the environmental footprint of DNA storage and computation using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). This emerging technology promises a drastic reduction in the energy consumption of information storage and processing. The project will first examine the environmental footprint of basic biochemical processes, then quantify the impacts of this emerging technology in collaboration with experts in LCA and DNA nanotechnology.
Emerging technologies attempt to justify their widespread use either by their power, their efficiency or, more recently, by their sustainability. For obvious reasons, computing and information processing are bursting at the seams with technological innovations. However, a major concern is the increasing consumption of energy and materials for data storage and retrieval.
For the past ten years, DNA has been considered a promising material support for digital data storage, after having been the support for biological data storage for a few billion years. DNA has demonstrated its ability to encode information at very high densities, up to 1E18 bits/mm3, eight orders of magnitude higher than current hard disk technology. What’s more, it has the capacity to store data for long periods (in excess of 1,000 years) without consuming energy. The disadvantages of this emerging technology are the slowness of data retrieval and the high cost of data writing, the latter being due to current DNA synthesis technology.
One possibility for moving from slow reading (i.e. cold storage) to fast reading (i.e. hot storage) of data stored in DNA is to perform calculations and data searches directly with the DNA. A first step in this direction was taken by our collaborators in a recent work on enzymatic neural networks. This technology uses enzymatic reactions to implement a DNA-encoded enzymatic neural network that performs calculations directly on data stored in DNA. Remarkably, this technology consumes 30,000 times less energy than its electronic equivalent to perform a given calculation.
1 Erlich, Y. & Zielinski, D. DNA Fountain enables a robust and efficient storage architecture. Science 355, 950–954
(2017).
2 Church, G. M., Gao, Y. & Kosuri, S. Next-Generation Digital Information Storage in DNA. Science 337, 1628–
1628 (2012).
3 Okumura, S. et al. Nonlinear decision-making with enzymatic neural networks. Nature 610, 496–501 (2022).
4 Bergerson, J. A. et al. Life cycle assessment of emerging technologies: Evaluation techniques at different stages of
market and technical maturity. J of Industrial Ecology 24, 11–25 (2020)..
5 Nguyen, B. et al. Architecting Datacenters for Sustainability: Greener Data Storage using Synthetic DNA. in
Electronics Goes Green 2020 (IEEE, 2020).
6 Zadorin, A. S. et al. Synthesis and materialization of a reaction–diffusion French flag pattern. Nature Chemistry 9,
990 (2017).
7 De Paepe, M., Jeanneau, L., Mariette, J., Aumont, O. & Estevez-Torres, A. Purchases dominate the carbon footprint
of research laboratories. PLOS Sustainability and Transformation 3, e0000116 (2024).
8 Loubet, P. et al. Life cycle assessment of ICT in higher education: a comparison between desktop and single-board
computers. Int J Life Cycle Assess 28, 255–273 (2023).
Activities
In this project, we will go beyond this rough estimate of energy consumption and attempt to quantify the environmental footprint of DNA storage and computation. To do this, we will work within the framework of prospective life cycle assessment (LCA), taking as our starting point a recent LCA study on DNA storage. The project will benefit from our strong expertise in both DNA nanotechnology and LCA, and will be carried out in close collaboration with Philippe Loubet, Associate Professor at Bordeaux INP and LCA expert.
Skills
-Life cycle assessment, ideally with prospective LCA practice
-Knowledge of biophysics/biochemistry and nanotechnologies
-Pyhton programming or equivalent
-Writing of scientific articles
Work Context
The work will be carried out at the LASIRE laboratory, at the chemistry-environment interface, in the context of a French-Japanese collaboration funded by the CNRS (https://www.cnrs.fr/fr/nos-recherches/france-2030/projet-ri2/calcadn). The candidate will work as a member of the Lasire Environmental Physical Chemistry team, which includes water and atmospheric chemists and ecologists. The thesis will be supervised by André Estevez-Torres (Research Director in Chemistry/Sustainability Sciences) in collaboration with Philippe Loubet, LCA specialist at Bordeaux INP. This work will be carried out within the context of the Institute for Environmental and Social Transitions at the University of Lille, in a very rich and interdisciplinary working environment on environmental issues.
The position is located in a sector under the protection of scientific and technical potential (PPST), and therefore requires, in accordance with the regulations, that your arrival is authorized by the competent authority of the MESR.
Constraints and risks
-Computer work
