More than four million computers are now helping researchers fight the COVID-19 pandemic by using the freely available software Folding@home.
When the crowdsourced supercomputing project first announced a shift to coronavirus research they asked for new volunteers to run its software and expand its computing capacity.
Organizations and citizen scientists from all walks of life heeded the call. Now, about four months later, the number of volunteers has increased a hundredfold.
Based at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, the computing project simulates the movements—or folding—of proteins involved in disease. Researchers leading the effort pivoted quickly to COVID-19 and found a wealth of people eager to help.
You can download the Folding@home software and start contributing to COVID-19 research here.
How does Folding@home work?
Before the switch to the novel coronavirus, about 30,000 devices were running Folding@home software.
With the prospect of contributing to coronavirus research, new volunteer “folders” boosted that number to over four million to date, with major companies and organizations eager to donate their own computing resources to the cause.
Many of the companies lending support are involved with computer technology, including those that make graphics cards for video gaming, antivirus software, and cloud computing systems.
Even professional sports have jumped in to help. La Liga, the Spanish professional soccer league, shifted the use of its supercomputer from a focus on catching illegal broadcasts of games—the league’s soccer matches were halted during the peak of the pandemic—to a focus on protein folding.
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