Grid Computing Saves Cancer Researchers Decades

Stony Stevenson writes "Canadian researchers have promised to squeeze "decades" of cancer research into just two years by harnessing the power of a global PC grid. The scientists are the first from Canada to use IBM's World Community Grid network of PCs and laptops with the power equivalent to one of the globe's top five fastest supercomputers. The team will use the grid to analyze the results of experiments on proteins using data collected by scientists at the Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute in Buffalo, New York. The researchers estimate that this analysis would take conventional computer systems 162 years to complete."

Comments

I used to run Folding@...

[kcbanner]

...as a competition with friends. But then I realized that I didn't really need to use my computers as heaters...and did a number for the planet and closed the client.

Re:I used to run Folding@...

[ZorinLynx]

This only applies if you use electric heating.

In most places, electrical energy costs a HELL of a lot more per watt-hour than other sources like natural gas, oil, propane, and so on.

So unless you heat your home with electricity, which practically no one north of Florida does unless they have VERY cheap electrical power, you'll still be paying more by running computers.

How good are the programs

[gringer]

I hope they're using programs that've had a few computer scientists' eyes over them. One of the issues I see with supercomputing is that people tend to see it as a way to get around dumb code(1) — if the computer's fast enough, you can implement *five* infinite loops, have an exponential time algorithm, and still get the calculations done before dinner!

(1) although from their point of view, it's just slow code.

162 years?

[sayfawa]

Okay, not that I'm knocking how cool this grid computing is, but that estimate of 162 without grid computing couldn't possibly be taking into account the acceleration of computing power. Maybe with today's computers it would take 162 years, but after the first couple of years just get a new computer and cut the time in half.

Which reminds me of how towards the end of my grad school career I did hours long simulations that would have taken weeks at the beginning of grad school. I was in grad school a long time :(

Re:162 years?

[JK_the_Slacker]

We're computer scientists. We can calculate these kinds of things. Protein folding calculations take a ridiculous amount of time and processing power. That's a reflection of how complex your dna is, not a reflection of how much processing power we have at our disposal. If we could borrow from the computing power of the future, then you might be right. But the fact remains, we only have what's at our disposal now. At the current state of computing technology, the calculations would take 162 years.

That's the thing, though... as computing power scales, so does the distributed computing. With one centralized server, if you start running a simulation on it, you have to continue to run that simulation on that server. On the other hand, in a distributed environment, when newer, more powerful machines come out, you can just set up a simulation client on it, and increase your calculation speed by that much. I used to run Folding @ Home on a 700 MHz computer with 256 MB of RAM. I later upgraded to a 1600 MHz computer with 512 MB of RAM. Now, I fold on a 2.2 GHz dual-core machine with 2.5 Gig of RAM. Does the newer machine do the work much faster than the two older machines? Yes, it does. Does that mean that the work I did on those older machines was needless? No. I still fold occasionally on the 1.6 GHz machine, and it takes about a week to turn over a WU, as opposed to less than 24 hours on my main machine. Should I stop folding on the old one because the new one works so much faster? No, because that's about 52 WUs I don't have to fold on my main machine per year. It's an increase in computing power, and that's always desirable in a situation like this.

It's all fine and dandy to talk about how much computing speed will increase in the future... but, in the end, reality overcomes theory. There are people dying of cancer right now, people that can be helped by letting computers do the work. True, in two years, the work will likely get done faster... but, that doesn't change the fact that we can't just sit around and wait. When those better computers come in to play, then let's add them to the pool. Until then, let's get something done.

Re:Desktops are not supercomputers

[deadline]

I'm not talking about spare cycles. I'm talking about the naive notion that gets repeated in the press "the combined power of all these computers equals one of the fastest supercomputers in the world" For trivial parallel applications this might be true, but just once I would like to see these "supercomputers" run a simple parallel benchmark like High Performance Linpack (used for the Top500 list). My guess is the number of real FLOPS would be much less than expected -- if it even finished. Don't get me wrong, using computers like this is great idea, it is not one of the most power computers in the world, however.

Open Source Software Cures Cancer

[atwtftg]

According to the World Community Grid website:

World Community Grid is making [this] technology available only to public and not-for-profit organizations to use in humanitarian research that might otherwise not be completed due to the high cost of the computer infrastructure required in the absence of a public grid. As part of our commitment to advancing human welfare, all results will be in the public domain and made public to the global research community.

WCG uses the Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing (BOINC) client, an open source software project that runs on Linux, Mac and Windows. Headline should read Open Source Software Cures Cancer ;-)

BoincStats shows you who is contributing to World Community Grid projects. Check it out...and ask yourself why you aren't contributing.