EPFL lends computing power to fight against the coronavirus

CDC image of the ultrastructural morphology exhibited by coronaviruses © Alissa Eckert, MS; Dan Higgins, MAMS EPFL is contributing significant computing resources to the open science project [email protected] , which uses protein dynamics simulations to explore potential coronavirus drug targets. Launched nearly 20 years ago, the international [email protected] project invites volunteers to contribute computing resources to the simulation of protein dynamics. In late February, [email protected] announced an effort to generate simulations aimed at providing insights into how the new coronavirus infects cells - and how the virus might be defeated. Amir Zamir , a professor in the School of Computer and Communication Sciences ( IC ), initiated EPFL's contribution to [email protected] with one of his students, Alexander Sax, who was already familiar with the project. Thanks to systems engineer Yoann Moulin and computer scientist Carlos Perez of IC's information technology team, SIFAC , EPFL has so far committed 100 32-gigabyte data center GPUs (graphics processing units) - "a serious contribution", Zamir says - to the [email protected] project. Following the temporary closure of the EPFL campus due to coronavirus on March 16^th, classroom and laboratory computers have gone unused. Fittingly, SIFAC has also harnessed some of these units for the simulation effort.