See! Video Games Can Save Lives

This is crazy. You can now "use your video game platform":http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/home-entertainment/ps3-folding-update-coming-... (Sony PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360) and help Stanford University researchers decipher the structure of proteins through the "*Folding@Home*":http://folding.stanford.edu/ project. Each video game that signs up gets assigned a portion of the data calculation--collectively it becomes a huge distributed super computer. Video game platforms, such as the PS3, because of their graphics engines on steroids excel at heavy computational workloads. It's almost as if it was designed for this work. bq. Some of the key accomplishments made since the Folding@home program launched on PS3 include: * More than 250,000 unique PS3 users have registered to the program in just one month. * PS3 users are delivering nearly 400 teraflops, achieving a total computing power of over 700 teraflops at a single moment. This is more than double the computing capacity of the network before PS3 joined the program (*2) * The "halo-effect" of PS3 has been evident as the number of active PCs has increased by 20 percent in the last month. Understanding the folding sequence of proteins will give researchers insight in the development of numerous diseases: bq. Moreover, when proteins do not fold correctly (i.e. "misfold"), there can be serious consequences, including many well known diseases, such as Alzheimer's, Mad Cow (BSE), CJD, ALS, Huntington's, Parkinson's disease, and many Cancers and cancer-related syndromes. So you see, video games can change the world too. On another note, if you want to meet other folks using video games to change the world, make sure to check out "Games for Change":http:/www.gamesforchange.org and their 2007 Festival which will be in New York City on June 11-12 at the New School. I attended last year's and am hoping to go this year as well. (thanks "Gizmodo":http://www.gizmodo.net)