Beta testing is in progress for GPU work units, which can help speed up the process of identifying potential treatments for COVID-19.
Research team member Dr. Martina Maritan created an infographic (portion shown above) about the project to help outline the full research process. You can click here to see the full details.
Background
OpenPandemics - COVID-19 was created to help accelerate the search for potential COVID-19 treatments. The project also aims to build a fast-response, open source toolkit that will help all scientists quickly search for treatments in the event of future pandemics.
In late 2020, the researchers announced that they had selected 70 compounds (from an original group of approximately 20,000) that could be promising to be investigated as potential inhibitors of the virus that causes COVID-19. Lab testing is currently underway for 25 of these compounds.
Beta testing for GPU work units
We're currently conducting beta testing for GPU work units. (Beta testing is generally the final step before a program or product is released to the general public.) So far, World Community Grid's tech team has completed four rounds of this testing, and recently launched a fifth round, which you can read about in our forum.
Each round of testing helps to identify errors, which are then fixed before the final version is released. We're very grateful to all volunteers who are participating in this testing by donating their GPU power and documenting their results.
Even after GPU work units are released for all volunteers with devices that have GPU, we will continue to create and release regular work units that use CPU power. This will help keep the work going at a good pace, and will ensure that everyone who wants to contribute computing power can participate.
Current status of work units
- Available for download: 1,682 batches
- In progress: 2,602 batches (18,377,085 work units)
- Completed: 30,576 batches
3,071 batches in the last 30 days
Average of 102 batches per day - Estimated backlog: 16 days*
*We will be creating more work units, as there is more work to be done for this project.
Click here to learn more about World Community Grid's monthly project updates.