DNA stores more data per ounce than any man-made storage media yet devised. That makes detangling it and decoding gene sequences for statistical analysis a mathematically intense undertaking. “From a numerical point of view, if you’ve got 1,000 individuals in your study and you’re typing 100,000 to a million markers, you’ve got at least 200 million points of data,” says Dr. Michael Barmada, a statistical geneticist with the University of Pittsburgh.