WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.240 When you think of a supercomputer, you probably picture a bunch of server racks covered in 00:00:04.240 --> 00:00:11.520 blinking lights in a lab somewhere. But did you know that you can easily make your home PC part of a supercomputer for free 00:00:11.520 --> 00:00:17.280 and for a good cause? The subject of today's video is a project called Folding at Home. 00:00:17.280 --> 00:00:24.280 And no, we're not talking about laundry. Folding at Home started at Stanford University, but has now run from multiple sites around 00:00:24.280 --> 00:00:28.480 the world and the goal is to research protein folding. 00:00:28.480 --> 00:00:32.680 But how does it do this with home computers? And what the heck is protein folding anyway? 00:00:32.680 --> 00:00:36.200 Well stay with me here, cause protein isn't just the stuff that weight lifters drink by 00:00:36.200 --> 00:00:41.960 the bucketful. Your body uses all sorts of different proteins for everything from building muscle fibers 00:00:41.960 --> 00:00:48.520 to intercellular signaling. And the crucial thing to remember about proteins is that their function depends heavily on 00:00:48.520 --> 00:00:52.880 their shape, which is where the term folding comes in. 00:00:52.880 --> 00:00:57.600 After a protein is assembled, it has to fold into its proper shape to be useful. 00:00:57.600 --> 00:01:01.440 Unlike how you can't throw a piece of paper across the room until it's in the correct 00:01:01.440 --> 00:01:08.000 shape, I choose ball. But unlike a paper airplane, which you can just follow simple instructions for, protein 00:01:08.000 --> 00:01:15.040 folding is much more complicated. You see, proteins are made up of 20 different kinds of smaller units called amino acids. 00:01:15.040 --> 00:01:20.480 And while they're structurally similar, all 20 of them have different side chains that, 00:01:20.480 --> 00:01:28.760 as the name implies, stick off to the side of the molecule. When you connect a bunch of amino acids together, linearly, to form a protein, these side chains 00:01:28.760 --> 00:01:33.160 interact with each other in ways that cause the protein to fold depending on how they're 00:01:33.160 --> 00:01:40.200 shaped. And they're electrical properties as well. As you can imagine, the more amino acids, the more complicated these interactions become. 00:01:40.200 --> 00:01:44.400 And a typical protein might be hundreds of amino acid residues long. 00:01:44.400 --> 00:01:49.760 And of course, it's critical for a protein to end up in the correct shape, or conformation, 00:01:49.760 --> 00:01:57.640 because otherwise it couldn't function. For example, cells have proteins on their surfaces that serve as signaling receptors, 00:01:57.640 --> 00:02:01.880 and they only function because they're shaped in a certain way that allows them to bind 00:02:01.880 --> 00:02:06.200 with the signaling molecules or other proteins from outside the cell. 00:02:06.200 --> 00:02:14.520 Kind of like two puzzle pieces coming together. The TLDR is that understanding how proteins fold has very important implications in medicine. 00:02:14.520 --> 00:02:19.240 For example, understanding how viral proteins interact with cell membranes to invade cells 00:02:19.240 --> 00:02:22.800 is critical to finding treatments to some viral diseases. 00:02:22.800 --> 00:02:27.400 So the team behind the project is currently using Folding at Home to research the novel 00:02:27.400 --> 00:02:30.400 coronavirus that causes COVID-19. 00:02:30.400 --> 00:02:34.280 The better we can understand what parts of the virus, especially the ones that bind to 00:02:34.280 --> 00:02:38.760 human cells, could be attacked for the drugs, the more likely it is that we can develop 00:02:38.760 --> 00:02:41.760 medicines that can treat or cure the disease. 00:02:41.760 --> 00:02:46.200 But anyways, this is Techquickie, not Biology Quickie, so let's tie this all back to the 00:02:46.200 --> 00:02:53.600 Folding at Home project. It turns out that simulating protein folding patterns is very difficult computationally. 00:02:53.600 --> 00:02:58.820 In nature, proteins fold in a tiny fraction of a second, but it can take years of computer 00:02:58.820 --> 00:03:04.720 time to sort out exactly how a protein will fold given a certain amino acid sequence. 00:03:04.720 --> 00:03:09.720 And a big part of the problem is that we don't yet fully understand the mechanisms behind 00:03:09.720 --> 00:03:15.680 protein folding. So the idea behind Folding at Home is to leverage spare home computing power in order to solve 00:03:15.680 --> 00:03:21.720 these difficult problems. All you need to do to participate, like I am, is install a client onto your home PC 00:03:21.720 --> 00:03:27.740 from the Folding at Home website. The program will then give your system part of a folding simulation to run and then send 00:03:27.740 --> 00:03:34.520 back to the program servers. You can specify how much of your PC's spare computing muscle to use depending on how much 00:03:34.520 --> 00:03:41.120 you want it to affect your power bill. You can also choose whether to run the simulations only when the system is idle or also when 00:03:41.120 --> 00:03:46.280 you're actively using them. Or maybe you choose depending on how hot your house is already. 00:03:46.280 --> 00:03:49.560 If you have a high-end graphics card, you're going to help you even more. 00:03:49.560 --> 00:03:53.960 The highly parallel nature of GPU architectures, which you can learn more about up here, can 00:03:53.960 --> 00:03:58.640 really speed up simulations. But you also don't need super fancy hardware. 00:03:58.640 --> 00:04:02.200 The current version of the client supports CPUs all the way back to Pentium 4. 00:04:02.200 --> 00:04:07.880 Now, it might seem like the impact one system makes on the project is miniscule. 00:04:07.880 --> 00:04:12.080 But all that spare computing power really adds up, and taken collectively, the Folding 00:04:12.080 --> 00:04:16.220 at Home network is up there with the world's top supercomputers. 00:04:16.220 --> 00:04:19.800 This has enabled real scientific breakthroughs that would have been much harder to reach 00:04:19.800 --> 00:04:23.840 otherwise. Hundreds of scientific papers have been published from the project's findings, and they've 00:04:23.840 --> 00:04:31.100 also been useful for those involved in drug discovery. So if you can spare a bit of power, download the Folding at Home app today. 00:04:31.100 --> 00:04:37.720 Join the LTT Folding team and make a difference. Your PC might even wind up finding a cure for the coronavirus, which could not only 00:04:37.720 --> 00:04:42.160 save lives but also finally put an end to all these people hoarding toilet paper. 00:04:42.160 --> 00:04:46.140 What's up with that anyway? Jesus, it doesn't make you poo more. You poo the same amount. 00:04:46.140 --> 00:04:50.780 Anyway. So thanks for watching, guys. If you liked this video, give it a thumbs up, get subscribed, and hit us up in the comments 00:04:50.780 --> 00:04:54.900 section with your suggestions for topics that we should cover in the future.