We normally use our collective voices to advocate to the world’s leaders on the fight against poverty and global disease. Today, I was doing some reading that made me think we might be able to use our collective computing power.

Unfortunately, ONE hasn’t figured out a way to fight extreme poverty using your computer’s idle processing time (think screen savers), but the folks at UC Berkeley have figured out a way to help fight some of the diseases that are hitting the developing world the hardest by doing just that.

There is a lot of research underway on diseases that impact the world’s poor. In some cases, that research requires a significant amount of computational resources. One project, for example, simulates the transmission of malaria. Another maps three dimensional proteins that could one day help find cures for HIV/AIDS and others.

Thanks to the internet, supercomputers aren’t the only way for that research to happen anymore. Something called distributed computing allows personal computers around the world to work together to essentially form one single supercomputer. Seems pretty similar to our grassroots advocacy model here at ONE.

This whole concept is part of the BOINC Project (Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing Project). You might have already guessed that it’s run by the University of California at Berkley. Each of the projects you can volunteer your computer for is run by completely independent entities. According to BOINC, “Some are based at universities and research labs, others are run by companies and individuals.” You can read a New York Times Article on the project.

It’s pretty easy to get started. First, you have to pick a project (e.g. what disease you want to help cure). I can’t speak to which project is best or attest to the quality of the research being done, but the projects I list below have websites detailing their work. BOINC “believes their descriptions (institution and area of research) are accurate.”

Below are names of the projects related to developing world diseases and their stated goals from BOINC site:

1. Malariacontrol.net – “Simulation models of the transmission dynamics and health effects of malaria are an important tool for malaria control. They can be used to determine optimal strategies for delivering mosquito nets, chemotherapy, or new vaccines which are currently under development and testing. Such modeling is extremely computer intensive, requiring simulations of large human populations with a diverse set of parameters related to biological and social factors that influence the distribution of the disease.”
2. World Community Grid – “To further critical non-profit research on some of humanity’s most pressing problems by creating the world’s largest volunteer computing grid. Research includes HIV/AIDS, cancer, muscular dystrophy, dengue, fever and many more.”
3. Rosetta@home – “Determine the 3-dimensional shapes of proteins in research that may ultimately lead to finding cures for some major human diseases. By running Rosetta@home you will help us speed up and extend our research in ways we couldn’t possibly attempt without your help. You will also be helping our efforts at designing new proteins to fight diseases such as HIV, Malaria, Cancer, and Alzheimer’s.”

You can read more about the BOINC project on their site.

You have to download and install a program, then select the project you want to volunteer your computer for from a list, but it doesn’t take much time. I downloaded the program and signed up to work on MalariaControl.net in about five minutes today. I created “The ONE Campaign” team, so if you do sign up, feel free to join our team. I recommend you check out the preferences of the program so you can determine when it runs and how much space it takes up on your computer.

I am going to go get lunch now and let my computer do some of the disease-fighting.

-Josh Peck, ONE.org