14 DAY TRIAL // Folding@home, a distributed computing network which studies protein folding and protein folding disease, announced it intends to integrate its service on Sony's upcoming gaming consoles Playstation 3 and named the project 'Cure@PS3'.
The representatives said that the company expects to reach an overall performance of about 100 gigaflops per console because of PS3's cell processor, and a petaflop at about 10.000 consoles.
"The PS3 Folding@home client will also support some advanced visualization features. While the Cell microprocessor does most of the calculation processing of the simulation, the Nvidia supplied RSX graphics chip of the console displays the actual folding process in real-time using new technologies such as HDR and ISO surface rendering. It's even possible to navigate the 3D space of the molecule using the interactive controller of the PS3, allowing users to look at the protein from different angles in real-time," informs The Inquirer.
The officials added that by using the processing power offered by the PS3, the program will benefit from a greater appreciation and of new capabilities that will facilitate the further study of several diseases such as the Alzheimer's Disease, Huntington's Disease, and numerous forms of cancer.
"This is probably one of the best uses for wasted processing power (and GPU power), and we hope PS3 users adopt the client en masse," Folding@home said.