An Estimate of the Total DNA in the Biosphere | Zendy

Hanna Landenmark | Zendy; Duncan H. Forgan | Zendy; Charles S. Cockell | Zendy

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An Estimate of the Total DNA in the Biosphere

Author(s) -

Hanna Landenmark,

Duncan H. Forgan,

Charles S. Cockell

Publication year - 2015

Publication title -

plos biology

Language(s) - English

Resource type - Journals

SCImago Journal Rank - 4.127

H-Index - 271

eISSN - 1545-7885

pISSN - 1544-9173

DOI - 10.1371/journal.pbio.1002168

Subject(s) - biosphere , biology , genome , dna , evolutionary biology , organism , genetics , computational biology , ecology , gene

Modern whole-organism genome analysis, in combination with biomass estimates, allows us to estimate a lower bound on the total information content in the biosphere: 5.3 × 10 31 (±3.6 × 10 31 ) megabases (Mb) of DNA. Given conservative estimates regarding DNA transcription rates, this information content suggests biosphere processing speeds exceeding yottaNOPS values (10 24 Nucleotide Operations Per Second). Although prokaryotes evolved at least 3 billion years before plants and animals, we find that the information content of prokaryotes is similar to plants and animals at the present day. This information-based approach offers a new way to quantify anthropogenic and natural processes in the biosphere and its information diversity over time.

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