The First Programmable Turing Complete Chemical Computer | Lee Cronin, University of Glasgow

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Foresight Molecular Machines Group
Lee Cronin , University of Glasgow
The First Programmable Turing Complete Chemical Computer
Lee Cronin was born in the UK and was fascinated with science and technology from an early age getting his first computer and chemistry set when he was 8 years old. This is when he first started thinking about programming chemistry and looking for inorganic aliens. He went to the University of York where he completed both a degree and PhD in Chemistry and then on to do post docs in Edinburgh and Germany before becoming a lecturer at the Universities of Birmingham, and then Glasgow where he has been since 2002 working up the ranks to become the Regius Professor of Chemistry in 2013 aged 39. He has one of the largest multidisciplinary chemistry-based research teams in the world, having raised over $35 M in grants and current income of $15 M. He has given over 300 international talks and has authored over 350 peer-reviewed papers with recent work published in Nature, Science, and PNAS. He and his team are trying to make artificial life forms, find alien life, explore the digitization of chemistry, understand how information can be encoded into chemicals and construct chemical computers.
Foresight Molecular Machines Group
A group of scientists, entrepreneurs, and institutional allies who cooperate to advance molecular machines, atomic precision, applications in energy, medicine, and material science, and long-term progress toward Richard Feynman’s vision of nanotechnology.
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Zoom Transcription: INSERT LINK
Join us:
► Twitter: / foresightinst
► Facebook: / foresightinst
► Instagram: / existentialhope
► LinkedIn: / foresight-institute
► Support to join: foresight.org/...
Foresight Institute advances technologies for the long-term future of life, focusing on molecular machine nanotechnology, biotechnology, and computer science.
Follow us here for videos concerning our programs on Molecular Machines, Biotechnology & Health Extension, Intelligent Cooperation, and Existential Hope.

[@dantv23]

This could get really interesting really quickly!

[@oker59]

I remember reading about the carbohydrate synthesizer; they've also made artificial ribosomes.

[@xlyg343]

I understand this video is old, and find it extremely interesting in its own right, but I ended up here trying to find the(I believe) opposite of this. A chemical computer, meaning using chemical compounds designed for computing power. Biomass as opposed to what we generally use today.

[@sdsa007]

I think DNA+DNA polyermase works as a computer to store the blueprints of enzymes, in the form of genes, and it even looks like a Turing machine with a single tape roll. except because it's double-helix DNA, it has an analogy for tape-backup!

[@xlyg343]

@@sdsa007 wow. Cool! Thank you kindly for that reply.

[@techiheed1845]

Sublime from Lee

[@erpktiwari]

Well Explained.

[@againagain394]

Amazing

[@arvinsenglishph2293]

anew fan here from PH

[@ashhempsall9803]

Dear Minds, I'm a writer and painter, self-taught and certainly not any kind of qualified anything in science. So with that in mind:: What if one were to look at Death instead of Life? Whereby Death presumably means the reabsorbing of the matter and energy of Living entities back into elemental states. By looking at where Life 'goes', flip side of the coin whereby Life 'appears'. Could one derive useful data in this scenario? To then reverse engineer Death back to Life? This must sound very naive! But I'm so curious. Good luck ( if that's how Life started!) and following keenly the work of Cronin and Co. hoping that the ~Co. comes to include all other relevant disciplines in this amazing project.

[@ivanbarreras9445]

Hmmm i think what you are talking about in biology would be decomposition. So maybe fungi would interest you greatly. Microrrizal fungi are very interesting.

[@ashhempsall9803]

@@ivanbarreras9445 thank you Ivan.I will study.🙏

[@theultimatereductionist7592]

Yes. I believe we will conquer - i.e. reverse - death and bring all the dead back some day. Massive mathematics + technology will be required.

[@paulreader1777]

You pose an interesting question. One of the current challenges in the origin of life is that now we know life exists and is (in a very broad sense) self-sustaining with evolution operating to regulate outcomes there is little likelihood of discovering any prime conditions conducive to life beginning. If chemputation has adequate complexity of conditions it might stumble upon the necessary solution.

[@mechadense]

39:08 questions

[@amirfromisrael5662]

WOW

[@Tony-hs8mu]

The first are brains.

[@theultimatereductionist7592]

​ @Calvin Sylveste Music, art, entertainment, acting are all trivially easy to do. Any simpleton can do it, because the world is full of simpletons who do those things. Because there exists NO definition of right vs wrong, true or false, in entertainment. But coding IS INSANELY difficult. Getting programs to work as you want IS INCREDIBLY hard. You clearly have NEVER coded/programmed in your life. Why do you think coders/ programmers are in such high demand and so hard to find?

[@baltofarlander2618]

Username checks out.

[@mysterypink824]

All these coding and carefully designed experiments seem to prove Intelligent Design as the Origin of Life rather than mindless, spontaneous chemical evolution

[@theultimatereductionist7592]

19:11 No. Bad idea. You SHOULD NOT try to force chemists to "be coders". I get this cute analogy between chemical steps and a turing machine. However, coding and coders is an entirely FULLTIME experience/lifetime/job that has to be & can only be done by people devoted to nothing BUT doing coding. Why do idiots get it into their heads that coding is trivially easy that everybody can or should do?

[@calvinsylveste8474]

Because coding is trivially easy and any simpleton can do it, even do it well given the right abstractions.

[@davidrojas4687]

@@calvinsylveste8474 the reason to it is that our computers are so advanced and the languages are so top level that it has gotten to that point

[@ivanbarreras9445]

Because coding is something many people can use without it being all that hard. So chemists could easily learn to code. Just like they learned to be chemists. And could learn to be a do many things

[@theultimatereductionist7592]

​@@calvinsylveste8474 Music, art, entertainment, acting are all trivially easy to do. Any simpleton can do it, because the world is full of simpletons who do those things. Because there exists NO definition of right vs wrong, true or false, in entertainment. But coding IS INSANELY difficult. Getting programs to work as you want IS INCREDIBLY hard. You clearly have NEVER coded/programmed in your life. Why do you think coders/ programmers are in such high demand and so hard to find?

[@theultimatereductionist7592]

@@ivanbarreras9445 So you think learning anything is easy, right? So then why aren't all people on earth multilingual in all 7000 languages?