endoh2 is an ASCII to DNA transcoder, quick example with text “YJL”:


% echo YJL | ./prog > YJL.c
This chromosome program synthesizes a double helix. The helix can also be compiled as a C program.

% cat YJL.c
#include "prog.c"

     AT
    C~~G
    C~~~G
    G~~~~C
     C~~~~G
      C~~~G
       A~~T
        CG
        TA
       G~~C
      G~~~C
     C~~~~G
    A~~~~T
    T~~~A
    A~~T
     CG
     TA
    A~~T
    A~~~T
    G~~~~C
     G~~~~C
      A~~~T
       A~~T
        GC

You don’t need to compile yourself, the Makefile can do that for you:


% make YJL
cc -Wall -std=c11  -O2    YJL.c   -o YJL

If you run the synthesized DNA program, you get the input ASCII text, is this a form of hiding information in DNA?


% ./YJL
YJL

If you ask how the source code, prog.c, looks like, well, you don’t need to have smart gene to guess, it’s all in the gene — no pun intended:


 #include      <stdio.h>
#define TA    q=/*XYXY*/
#define/*X    YXY*/CG r=
void p(int    n,int c){;
for(;n--;)    putchar(c)
#define Y(    z)d;d=c++\
%2<1?x=x*4    +z,c%8>5?\
x=x?p(1,x),   0:x:0:0;d=
#define/*X    YX*/C Y(1)
#define/*X    YX*/G Y(2)
 ;}int(*f)(  void),d,c,
 #define/*X  YX*/A Y(0)
  #define/*XY*/AT int\
     m(void/**/){d=
  #define/*XYX*/T Y(3)
 #define GC  d; return\
 0;}int(*f)  (void )=m;
x,q,r; int    main(){if(
f)f();else    {for(puts(
"#include"    "\40\"pro\
g.c\"\n\n     \101T"+0);
d=!d?x=(x=    getchar())
<0?0:x,8*8    :d,TA++c%8
,TA(1+7*q-    q*q)/3,r=c
*15-c*c-36    ,p(r<0?!q+
4:r/6+!q+4    ,32),q||x;
c%=16)q?p(    1,"ACGT"[x
/d&3]),p(q    ,126),p(1,
"TGCA"[x/d    &3]),d/=4,
p(001,10):    puts(c%8?\
"CG":"TA")    ;puts("GC"
 );}return     0;}/**/

The author said: “Enjoy DNA programming!” and “The synthesized helix of course follows the base-pairing rules for DNA: A is bonding only to T, and C is bonding only to G.”

I wonder if a DNA programming language can be done — or is there already one? Not for actual DNA, of course. If you know of Brainfuck, coding in only those brainfucking symbols, which I have done once five years ago, why not CGAT?

endoh2 is written in C11 by Yusuke Endoh, 2014-10-29, inspired by Perl’s Acme::DoubleHelix, it has 32 LOC or 785 bytes.