Star Trek producer Gene Roddenberry’s signature has boldly gone where no NFT has been before – into the code for life itself.
As early as 1965, Roddenberry signed a contract with Lucille Balls Desilu Productions to fund Star Trek. On November 30th, this signature was transferred to a non-fungible token (NFT) and implanted in the DNA code of a living bacterial cell – 30 years after the death of the science fiction legend.
Roddenberry entertainment describes it as the very first “Living Eco-NFT” and a “real intersection of science and science fiction”. The piece replicates and grows as the cells of the organism divide.
“As long as the bacteria stay alive, the cell can double at a rate that will make over a billion copies of the Eco-NFT overnight.”
It will be exhibited as a work of art entitled “El Primero” – Spanish for “The First” – during Art Basel 2021 in Miami.
Rational Vaccines CEO and Emmy Award winning director Agustin Fernandez starred in the play. “Storing information in DNA is a whole new category of opportunities when it comes to archiving data,” he said.
“It offers sustainable, environmentally friendly storage with exponentially larger capacities than anything the market currently has to offer.”
The NFTs live on the Solana Blockchain (SOL) with the support of Metaplex Studios.
“The Solana blockchain provides an extremely energy-efficient platform on which NFT builders can build,” said Stephen Hess, Interim CEO of Metaplex Studios.
Dr. Paul Predki was responsible for coding the digital data from the NFT into a DNA sequence and then storing this DNA in a naturally self-replicating bacterial cell.
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Star Trek are no stranger to collectibles or NFTs. In July 2020, Star Trek fans bought it 125,000 NFT trading cards with “Captain Kirk” William Shatner on the WAX blockchain. In June 2020, Shatner spoke about NFTs in a Interview with Cointelegraph Magazine: “The revolution is coming, not just on the street, but in the ether. It’s a revolution in knowledge. “
