DECRYPTHON AND WORLD COMMUNITY GRID LAUNCH AN APPEAL FOR 150000 INTERNET USERS !
Initiated in 2001 and relaunched in 2005 by the AFM and IBM in association with the CNRS, Decrypthon is a technology platform providing the computational power required to process complex data in biology today, whose volume is multiplied by two every year. This thus allows, through technologies called “grids”, to gather (in a grid) the capacity of several supercomputers (500 Gflop) installed by IBM in 6 French universities (Bordeaux 1, Lille 1, Paris 6 Jussieu, ENS Lyon, Crihan in Rouen, Orsay) and/or individual personal computers via the World Community Grid (World Community Grid). A dozen scientific projects selected through a call for tenders have been completed under the Decrypthon program.
The World Community Grid) is a grid for Internet users who make the unused computational power (on average 80%) of their computer, available to research projects of their choice. They simultaneously manage complex calculations that researchers have significantly divided. This “distributed calculation” therefore allows to considerably reduce processing times. The World Community Grid is the largest not-for-profit public computing grid with over 441 000 members in 200 countries and 1.2 million computers registered in the program. Since its launch, it has allowed to accomplish the equivalent of 235 000 years of calculations and to send 266 million results, i.e. nearly 2 results per second.
Decrypthon is a partnership between 3 partners: the AFM and IBM, historic partners since 2001 and the CNRS who joined us in 2005. These 3 partners make their expertise available and thus allow this technology to be accessible for scientific research. With a focus on patients and new therapeutic approaches, it is hoped that the Decrypthon programs will allow them to begin.
The Decrypthon molecular assembly project “Help Cure Muscular Dystrophy” is one of eight global humanitarian projects to benefit the current World Community Grid.
The World Community Grid) is a grid for Internet users who make the unused computational power (on average 80%) of their computer, available to research projects of their choice. They simultaneously manage complex calculations that researchers have significantly divided. This “distributed calculation” therefore allows to considerably reduce processing times. The World Community Grid is the largest not-for-profit public computing grid with over 441 000 members in 200 countries and 1.2 million computers registered in the program. Since its launch, it has allowed to accomplish the equivalent of 235 000 years of calculations and to send 266 million results, i.e. nearly 2 results per second.
Decrypthon is a partnership between 3 partners: the AFM and IBM, historic partners since 2001 and the CNRS who joined us in 2005. These 3 partners make their expertise available and thus allow this technology to be accessible for scientific research. With a focus on patients and new therapeutic approaches, it is hoped that the Decrypthon programs will allow them to begin.
The Decrypthon molecular assembly project “Help Cure Muscular Dystrophy” is one of eight global humanitarian projects to benefit the current World Community Grid.
WHAT ARE THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE UNIVERSITY GRID AND INTERNET USERS' GRID?
The choice of the grid used will depend on the characteristics of the research programs. Thus:
- The university grid allows to solve calculations over long periods, these calculations can be strongly coupled, dependent on each other. In fact, this grid consists of a high-speed network, available 24/24, and endowed with powerful machines that can quickly save and share a result needed to start the following calculation.
- The Internet users' grid (World Community Grid, sponsored by IBM) is composed of “volatile” computers - each user connects and disconnects from the Internet at his/her own pace, and turns his/her computer off and on at his/her convenience - connected by a lower speed networks. The calculations submitted to this grid should thus be loosely coupled, faster and more independent, but can be much more numerous.
