News

Screensaver harnesses computer power for cancer research

Susan Mayor, London

Researchers looking for new anticancer drugs are hoping to harness the unused capacity of personal computers through the launch last week of software linked to a screensaver that uses free computer capacity to assess the anticancer activity of millions of molecules.

The project is a collaboration between the University of Oxford and United Devices, a US technology company. Under the scheme, users download a free screensaver and software that uses spare capacity on the computer. The system, which uses what is known as peer to peer technology, creates a "virtual supercomputer" and makes enormous quantities of processing power available.

Each computer joining the scheme will be sent over the internet an initial package of models of 100 molecules together with a drug design software application called Think, which was developed at the university of Oxford, and a model of a protein implicated in cancer. The target molecules being tested initially include superoxide dismutase, an enzyme that protects against damage from free radicals; a Ras protein; and vascular endothelial growth factor.

Think will create three dimensional models of the trial molecules and test their interactions with the target protein. If a molecule interacts successfully, it will be sent back to the central server for further investigation. The intellectual property associated with any drug discovery resulting from the scheme will belong to the University of Oxford and the licence will be held by their research sponsor, the National Foundation for Cancer Research, a US cancer charity.

Professor Graham Richards, chairman of the chemistry department at the University of Oxford, said: "This project will provide a massive increase in computer power. We hope that at least one million people will sign up. This would give computer power that dwarfs the largest supercomputers currently available."

The response so far has been good. Three people were signing up to the scheme every second in the first few days after its launch. Professor Richards pointed out that the creation of a very large computer would greatly speed the search through the 250 million small molecules that the university has in its database of potential anticancer agents.

Intel Devices, which developed the software, said that downloading and running the program cost nothing and has no noticeable impact on a computer's performance because the program takes advantage of the processing power not being used. The system poses no risk for spreading computer viruses.

The screensaver can be found at www.ud.com or www.intel.com/cure