Storing the total amount of information encoded in DNA in the biosphere, 5.3 × 1031 megabases (Mb), would require approximately 1021 supercomputers with the average storage capacity of the world’s four most powerful supercomputers.
Using information on the typical mass per cell for each domain and group and the genome size, we estimate the total amount of DNA in the biosphere to be 5.3 × 10
31 (±3.6 × 10
31) megabase pairs (Mb). This quantity corresponds to approximately 5 × 10
10 tonnes of DNA, assuming that 978 Mb of DNA is equivalent to one picogram. Assuming the commonly used density for DNA of 1.7 g/cm
3, then this DNA is equivalent to the volume of approximately 1 billion standard (6.1 × 2.44 × 2.44 m) shipping containers. The DNA is incorporated within approximately 2 × 10
12 tonnes of biomass and approximately 5 × 10
30 living cells, the latter dominated by prokaryotes. By analogy, it would require 10
21 computers with the mean storage capacity of the world’s four most powerful supercomputers (Tianhe-2, Titan, Sequoia, and K computer) to store this information.
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.
