distributed computing

Playstation 3 Doubles Folding@Home Output!

I recently wrote about how you could put your spare computer time to good use by taking part in the Folding@Home project and that Playstation 3 owners could now harness the idle computing power of their new “beast” of a console by running Folding@Home software.

PS3s may not be selling as well as expected, but many of those PS3’s sold have now joined in this project, GameDailyBiz have reported that Stanford University (who run this programme) have announced that the total computing power being utilised in this good cause has now been doubled!

Distributed Computing Software Downloads

Folding@home is a distributed computing software system that means you can put your idle computer to good use by means of distributed computing project which is similar to one of the first projects of this type; SETI@home. Distributed computing software uses the spare computing cycles of your home computer by sending it a small chunk of work to process, which alone isn’t a great amount, but when thousands of other computers are also contributing to a project in this manner, all that combined processing power equals a huge supercomputer which can process highly complex data.

In this case, distributed computing software centres around simulating the folding of proteins in the human brain – which when they fold incorrectly cause diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Mad Cow (BSE), CJD, ALS, Huntington’s, Parkinson’s disease, and many Cancers and cancer-related syndromes. Folding@home hopes to help in the medical research of finding cures to these diseases and you can help this research by downloading and running the Folding@home software.