This thread concerns a Distributed Computing project called Folding @ Home, run by Vijay Pande and the Pande Group out of Stanford University in California. They also have members and equipment located at several other Universities. The basic scope of this project is to study the way proteins fold, or misfold, in the human body. The results of this research are aimed at finding treatments for Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Huntington’s, influenza, and some cancers. A list of the peer reviewed scientific papers that have come out of this project are here.
This is a really nice cause the Pande Group/Stanford University has, and I figured I’d share it with Waypoint. It’s also a really nice thing for anyone to do, it doesn’t take any effort at all to help out with this. We should get a strong group of PCs to help out with this. There’s even designated ‘teams’ you can join that are ranked by the collective amount of processing points gained over time, but more on that later.
Your PC can /probably/ run this, but just in case, the supported tech is listed below.
> Supported Hardware
> almost any Intel or AMD cpu (P III-450 or AMD equivalent)
> ATi/AMD 5xxx or higher gpu
> nVidia 8-series or higher gpu
>
> Supported OS
> Windows XP and up (cpu and gpu)
> Mac OS X (cpu only)
> Linux, many flavors (cpu only, some people have run gpu under wine)
Folding @ Home can be configured in a multitude of ways according to PC ability and user preference. From the simplest spare cycles on a 1 core PC to multiple motherboard AND GPU cores in really high powered PCs. At the basic level of control and user interface you do not have too many customization options. While these options are fine for most everyone, should you desire more control over the program you can right click on the icon in your icon trey for ‘advanced control’ and go from there.
Without further ado, here’s what you need to get started;
INSTRUCTIONS FOR JOINING THE WAYPOINT TEAM
Once it’s all download and installed you’ll be brought to a webpage on the site, this page will have a few different tabs. Click on ‘identity’. Should it not open automatically, right click on the icon in your icon trey and go to ‘Web Control’.
Enter a desired username, preferably your forum name.
Then enter the number 224820 under team #. This will ensure your identity and how much it has processed is lumped in with the group.
If you want to deal with a passkey, you’ll see the instructions reside on the identity tab.
And that’s it. Let’s fold some proteins and stuff, Waypoint. Your contribution ensures a quicker remedy to diseases like Cancer!