DNA storage is the process of encoding and decoding binary data into and out of synthesized strands of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid). In nature, DNA molecules contain the genetic blueprints for living cells and organisms.

To store a binary digital file as DNA,  individual bits (binary digits) of 1 and 0 are converted into the letters A, C, G, and T. These letters represent the four main components of DNA: adenine, cytosine, guanine, and thymine. The physical storage medium is a synthesized DNA molecule containing these four compounds in an order that corresponds to the order of the bits in the digital file. To retrieve the data, the  A, C, G, and T sequence representing the DNA molecule is decoded back into the original sequence of bits 1 and 0. 

Researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) have encoded audio, image, and text files into a synthesized DNA molecule about the size of a dust grain, and then successfully read the information from the DNA to recover the files, claiming 99.99 percent accuracy.