BAIN ATMI 2022
Mutational Music Project
TUTORIAL
Reginald Bain
Professor of Composition & Theory
University of South Carolina
School of Music
Columbia, SC 29208
rbain@mozart.sc.edu
National Human Genome Research Institute, Talking Glossary of
Genomic and Genetic Terms
https://www.genome.gov/genetics-glossary
Table of Contents
In order to demonstrate how genetic data may be mapped to musical parameters, I created two model experiments using Cycling '74's Max & MIDI: Experiment 1: Zika Melody (see Example 2), and Experiment 2: Zika Rhythm (see Example 3). Scientists in the field of auditory display refer to this approach as parameter mapping sonification (Grond and Berger 2011). In addition to introducing the data, software tools, and sonification approach, this tutorial briefly engages issues of design and aesthetics in the context of these two model sonification experiments, providing recommendations for further reading along the way. It is assumed the the reader has an undergraduate-level understanding of biology, genetics, and music theory.
2. Music from DNA
Some of the earliest attempts to create music from DNA were executed in the MIDI domain, so that is where we begin our journey. The early writings and experiments that have directly informed this musico-scientific work include: Hofstadter 1979, Hayashi and Munakata 1984, Munakata and Hayashi 1995, Dunn and Clark 1999, and Takahashi and Miller 2007. For a survey of other early research literature, see Dunn and Clark 1999, Jensen 2008, and Temple 2017.
3. Genetic Data
To get started making music from DNA, we'll need some data. One place you can download publicly-available genetic data is the:
National Center for Biotechnology
Information (NCBI)
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
In the experiments below we will sonify a nucleic acid sequence, but be sure to keep in mind that the sonifications you create for the course may be built around any type of genetic data; e.g., a protein sequence, gene expression data, epigenetic data, etc. You may even design a sonification around a biological model such as protein folding (see Taylor 2017).
To make the experiments easier to follow, we will use a short initial segment of a DNA sequence rather than an entire gene. The fragment we will use is from the Zika virus isolate Z110606033 polyprotein gene whose complete sequence is available in NCBI's open-access sequence database GenBank:
Zika virus isolate Z1106033 polyprotein
gene
GenBank: KU312312.1
4. Working with FASTA files
DNA sequences are commonly encoded using the text-based FASTA format for bioinformatics data. Learning how to work with FASTA files now will help prepare you to work with other types of data in the future. To store, edit, and save text files, you'll need a text editor. In the figures below, I used a free text editor for Mac OS by Bare Bones called BBEdit. I recommend the cross-platform text editor Atom for Windows users, or you may prefer one of the programs in this list of text editors available on Wikipedia.
The first four lines of the Zika virus isolate Z1106033 polyprotein gene (heretofore Zika) FASTA file are shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1. FASTA data
(Data credit: NCBI, GenBank: KU312312.1)
The first line is a header that describes the data. Notice that the header is marked by the special leading character symbol ">". The DNA sequence data begins in line 2. Each line of data in the FASTA file contains 70 characters, except for the last line which may contain fewer than 70 characters. It is also important to know that each line in a FASTA file ends with a line break. Figure 2 shows the "hidden" line breaks at the end of each 70-character line.
Figure 2. Line break characters
ACAGGTTTTATTTTGGATTTGGAAACGAGAGTTTCTGGTCA
As explained above, the two experiments below were created by mapping the four DNA nucleotide bases in the "zika41.txt" file to MIDI parameters in real time. In the first experiment, the aesthetic goal was to create an interesting melody. In the the second experiment, the aesthetic goal was to create an interesting rhythm.
ACAGGTTTTATTTTGGATTTGGAAACGAGAGTTTCTGGTCA
Figure 4. Mapping 1
(a) DNA nucleotide base-to-pitch mapping
DNA base |
MIDI Pitch |
|
A |
-> | 69 |
C |
-> | 60 |
G |
-> | 67 |
T |
-> | 70 |
A recording of the app's sonic output may be heard in Example 1.
Example 1. Default sonic output of the Max app ACGT
Melody
It should be mentioned that a 500 ms. duration is equivalent to a constant quarter-note pulse at a tempo of 120 beats per minute (abbr. b.p.m.).
The Zika Melody notated in Example 2 was composed using a real-time interactive compositional process; i.e., running the ACGT Melody app numerous times, I tweaked the duration, timbre, and initial DNA sequence length to taste. The DNA sequence length of 41 was chosen so that the melody would: (1) Have a length that is a prime number of bases – to achieve a rhythmic complexity in the pitch grouping structure upon repeated cycles and would wrap around smoothly; and (2) Imply an imperfect authentic cadence when a single cycle is stated;. The non-pitch parameters were chosen as described below:
In the music notation, please note that the time signature (4/4) is arbitrary and was chosen simply to make the melody easy to read.
Example 2. Sonification Experiment 1: Zika Melody
MIDI Realization
In Experiment 2, I mapped the DNA nucleotide bases in the "Zika41.txt" DNA sequence to durations in real time as shown in Figure 7.
Figure 5. Mapping 2
(a) Nucleotide base-to-duration mapping
DNA base |
Duration (ms.) |
|
A |
-> | 1000 |
C |
-> | 500 |
G |
-> | 250 |
T |
-> | 125 |
Example 3 shows the traditional music notation equivalent for the output of the Max app. To focus the listener's attention on the variation in duration, the following MIDI parameters were normalized:
The tempo (eighth note equals 120 b.p.m.) and changing meters in the traditional music notation are arbitrary. They were chosen to make the traditional music notation in Example 3 as readable as possible.
Cycling '74, Max
MakeMusic, Finale
Reason Studios, Reason
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Updated: April 7, 2023Reginald Bain | University of South Carolina | School of Music
https://www.reginaldbain.com