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View Full Version : OMW an update!


MONK
30th May 2005, 11:54
Post on UD (http://forum.grid.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=15876&start=40)

Post on WCG (not world cyber games) (http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/forums/wcg/viewthread?thread=2882)

OK so we are somewhere between 55% and 67% of the way through the human proteome folding project. The above links show the post of which an extract is below. The project should rap up in the next 3-6 months depending on how much the project drops off over the hot summer as people save power cool rooms and don't spend as much time inside. My personal guess is about 4 months finishing mid september to october.

The posts contain a list of some of the thigs that the project is looking into. For instance Bifidobacterium longum which I am told is important for having a healthy intestine!

Non-human proteomes on the grid, and their importance to human health

So far we’ve talked a lot about the human health side of this project, i.e. we’ve talked about the human proteome and what predicting human protein structures can hope to accomplish.

This project is devoted primarily to the human proteome and understanding the human proteome by predicting the structure of proteins of unknown function in the human proteome.

We are also, however, folding the proteins of unknown function in over 60 other complete genomes that we feel have an important impact on human quality of life. I list below a sampling of the other genomes we’re exploring as part of the proteome folding project on the worldcommunitygrid. I’ll give a sentence or two about each of them, but each organism has a lot of reasons for further study. I could give you the full list, but these represent a good mix. In general there are 4 categories of proteins we’re folding (all important for improving people’s health and/or quality of life):

1. Human proteins: Priority 1 for this project. Contribute to the understand the human proteome with structure prediction.

2. Human pathogens: understanding these nasty guys contributes to our efforts to knocking them out.

3. Environmental: More and more we are realizing that the living things in any ecosystem have methods for responding to pollution and other human influences in ways that lead us to believe that bioremediation of toxic waste sites is on the horizon. Understanding bugs/bacteria and archaea involved in the environment is the first step.

4. Model systems: These are organisms that are studied in the lab because they are safe, easy to work with and easy to manipulate. Much of what we understand about genetics and biology at large comes from studying these organisms.

Now for a few examples of non human proteomes on the grid:

(if you don’t see a genome/proteome listed here it doesn’t mean we’re not folding it, just that I’m sick of typing ... over 60 complete genomes were processed as part of this project)

MONK
16th June 2005, 00:06
Shocking a second update

Not a bad idea after the various problems they have had and a massive amount of perceived CBA in communicating with the punters.

Dear Members,

Lately, we have received expressions of concern from various members regarding a perceived lack of communication from grid.org administrators about project status, grid operations, old workunit data, etc.

Please accept this message as an official reply...

Grid.org continues to be an excellent tool used to process the intensive calculations inherent to new drug discovery, human protein mapping, and other such projects, which require vast amounts of compute power.

We, at Grid.org, certainly never wish to lessen the value of our public grid by offending our dear members. And we would never naively assume that our dear members would simply continue volunteering their computer idle time just because of their altruistic nature. Rather, we understand clearly that our members want to see first-hand the results of their efforts. Rest assured, we appreciate the concerns that have been expressed regarding communications and updates and/or the lack thereof.

Here's what we are doing to address these concerns:

1) Project Status
Currently on grid.org we have two projects underway: Ligandfit Cancer Project, and Human Protein Folding. To keep members apprised of the status of these two projects, as well as any other future projects, we propose adding a "status" sidebar on the main page of Grid.org. This status sidebar would be used as the official communication mechanism from grid.org to members relating to project status, system availability, breaking news, etc. Up until now, we've relied primarily on the forums to disseminate this type of information, but it's become obvious that a more central method of communication is necessary, and we believe that a status sidebar on the main grid.org page may be a good solution for this.

2) Grid Operations
The proposed status sidebar on the main grid.org page would also be used to provide status updates on grid.org availability and core operations.

3) Old Workunit Data
We are waiting on *new* data for the cancer project. Once this data becomes available, we will ensure that it is loaded onto the grid. The human protein folding project, as well, is in need of new data. However, the process for retrieving new data/splitting/creating jobs for the human protein folding project is quite different from the cancer project. As such, we are working diligently to update this process and make it more efficient.

I hope this communication has addressed, at least in part, some of the concerns recently expressed by our members.

Thanks for your patience,
jonathon

http://forum.grid.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=17143