Boink? No, BOINC!

Picture yourself an aspiring scientist? Want to become famous for discovering a pulsar? Or even more famous for making the first direct detections of gravitational-wave emission from spinning neutron stars? Actually, you probably won't become famous for discovering a pulsar, but you will receive a nicely framed plaque. Or maybe, you want to be the one who first makes contact with intelligent life from another planet? Then, BOINC is for you.

BOINC (Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing) is a project hosted by the University Of California Berkeley, a software platform for volunteer computing and desktop grid computing. It uses the idle time on your computer (Windows, Mac, or Linux) to cure diseases, study global warming, discover pulsars, and do many other types of scientific research. It's safe, secure, and easy. You chose a project or projects, download and run the BOINC software and enter an email and password.

Einstein@Home uses your computer to search for weak astrophysical signals from spinning neutron stars (also called pulsars) using data from the LIGO gravitational-wave detectors, the Arecibo radio telescope, and the Fermi gamma-ray satellite. Einstein@Home volunteers have already discovered forty six new neutron stars, and hope to find many more in the future. The long-term goal is to make the first direct detections of gravitational-wave emission from spinning neutron stars. Gravitational waves were predicted by Albert Einstein almost a century ago, but have never been directly detected. This would open up a new window on the universe and begin a new era in astronomy.

You probably have heard about or seen this one on TV. SETI@Home SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) is a scientific area with the goal to detect intelligent life outside Earth. Radio SETI, uses radio telescopes to listen for narrow-bandwidth radio signals from space. Such signals are not known to occur naturally, so a detection would provide evidence of extraterrestrial technology.

Radio telescope signals consist primarily of noise (from celestial sources and the receiver's electronics) and man-made signals such as TV stations, radar, and satellites. Modern radio SETI projects analyze the data digitally. More computing power (and this is where your computer comes in) enables searches to cover greater frequency ranges with more sensitivity.

Previous radio SETI projects have used special-purpose supercomputers, located at the telescope, to do the bulk of the data analysis. In 1995, David Gedye suggested using a virtual supercomputer composed of large numbers of Internet-connected computers, and organized the SETI@home project. It was originally launched in May 1999.

There are many other interesting and worthwhile projects you can join.

Climateprediction.net is a distributed computing project to produce predictions of the Earth's climate up to 2100 and to test the accuracy of climate models.

Enigma@home - 'The M4 Project is an effort to break 3 original Enigma messages with the help of distributed computing. The signals were intercepted in the North Atlantic in 1942 and are believed to be unbroken.'

Rosetta@home needs your help to determine the 3-dimensional shapes of proteins in research that may ultimately lead to finding cures for some major human diseases. By running the Rosetta program on your computer while you don't need it, you will help speed up and extend research in ways that couldn't possibly otherwise be attempted. You will also be helping efforts at designing new proteins to fight diseases such as HIV, Malaria, Cancer, and Alzheimer's.

Click here for a full list of projects.

There are also screen-savers that show real-time processing of the data your computer is working on.

Much of the project description and information in this article was taken from the project links cited. I don't want to take credit for that, just for bringing them to your attention if you have not heard of them before. Warning! Do not use these program's on your work or school computer unless you have explicit permission to do so. There have been instances of some being fired for doing so.

In addition to helping scientists around the world, there is also a bit of fun competition. Each project awards credits for each task you successfully complete. You can compete as an individual or on a team. You will also be ranked on a national and worldwide basis. Since there was no local team, I created Team Matawan Aberdeen Shark Attack to honor victims Lester Stillwell, Stanley Fisher, and survivor Joseph Dunn, of the infamous Matawan Creek shark attack of July 12, 1916 as we approach the one hundredth anniversary. And, you are more than welcome to join this team or start your own. You must have an account on Einstein@home or SETI@Home to join.