Oakley Holidays - Making a Difference
Established in 1919
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Limited Company No. 4487467
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Making a Difference Directory

58. Folding @ home

Do you have a computer? Do you spend most of your time browsing the internet, word processing or other non-intensive tasks? Do you want to help cure cancer? Alzheimer’s? ALS? Huntingdon’s? Parkinson’s?
If the answer to all these questions is yes, then you should start folding at home!
Not like that…


…with your computer!

WARNING: GEEK SPEAK!

Team work is what makes Folding@home so effective. All the processing is done by home users - and the net results is 3 times more powerful than the worlds most powerful supercomputer - all for free!

Folding@home network: 4.3 petaFLOPs
Biggest super computer: 1.5 petaFLOPs
Pocket calculator: 10 FLOPs
Folding@home...
• Performs complex simulations of how different protein molecules “fold” to form new ones with different properties.
• Knowing the ways that proteins fold, and the characteristics of each variant is key to understanding, and hopefully curing, genetic diseases like Huntingdon’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease and cancer.
• Runs in the background on your computer, silently downloading small files from the Stanford University servers in America, performing calculations and feeding the results back to a research team.
• Runs on the puniest laptop from 1999, right through to the most powerful desktops.
• Is completely virus and spyware.
• Knows how much you are taxing the computer, so it knows when to back off, and when to kick right in.
• Can run on PS3s automatically in between your gaming sessions.

So how can you run Folding@home?
• Download the Central Processing Unit (CPU) client here
• Install the program
• Add the program to your startup list for maximum effectiveness!
• E.g. on Windows, it’s a folder in the start menu. Copy a shortcut into it.
WARNING: GEEK SPEAK!

Graphics cards are especially suited to Folding@home work as they are made to perform similar calculations.

You can download a GPU client from here.


Oakley Contact: If you want some additional info, your Oakley contact is HAYDEN COLE who will be pleased to guide all potential Folders on the phone or by E mail

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50. Using your skills on a voluntary basis

53. Join the Freecycle Network

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