Ibercivis was a volunteer computing platform which allows

internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

users to participate in scientific research by donating unused computer cycles to run scientific simulations and other tasks. The original project, which became operational in 2008, was a scientific collaboration between the Portuguese and Spanish governments, but it is open to the general public and scientific community, both within and beyond the

Iberian Peninsula The Iberian Peninsula (), ** * Aragonese and Occitan: ''Peninsula Iberica'' ** ** * french: Péninsule Ibérique * mwl, Península Eibérica * eu, Iberiar penintsula also known as Iberia, is a peninsula in southwestern Europe, defi ...

. The project's name is a

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsIberia The Iberian Peninsula (), ** * Aragonese and Occitan: ''Peninsula Iberica'' ** ** * french: Péninsule Ibérique * mwl, Península Eibérica * eu, Iberiar penintsula also known as Iberia, is a peninsula in southwestern Europe, defi ...

'' and the

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

word , meaning '

citizen Citizenship is a "relationship between an individual and a state to which the individual owes allegiance and in turn is entitled to its protection". Each state determines the conditions under which it will recognize persons as its citizens, and ...

'. In April 2020, the volunteer computing platform was restarted by the Ibercivis Foundation and the

Spanish National Research Council The Spanish National Research Council ( es, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, CSIC) is the largest public institution dedicated to research in Spain and the third largest in Europe. Its main objective is to develop and promote res ...

in order to screen existing drugs for antiviral activity against

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) is a strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019), the respiratory illness responsible for the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The virus previously had a No ...

, the causative agent of the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

History

Ibercivis was developed in Spain with the cooperation of the Institute of Biocomputation and Physics of Complex Systems at the University of Zaragoza, CIEMAT, CETA-CIEMAT, the

(CSIC) and RedIris. The project tasks are issued by different scientific and technological centers in Spain with the aim of creating a functional platform for volunteer-based scientific computing. The project is a

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

an counterpart to the successful United States-based SETI@home and Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing (BOINC) volunteer computing projects. Ibercivis' predecessor, the University of Zaragoza-based volunteer computing project Zivis, began operation in 2007, and Ibercivis itself started operating in June 2008. The Zivis project was a local volunteer computing application funded by the '' ayuntamiento'' (city council) of the city of

Zaragoza Zaragoza, also known in English as Saragossa,''Encyclopædia Britannica'"Zaragoza (conventional Saragossa)" is the capital city of the Zaragoza Province and of the autonomous community of Aragon, Spain. It lies by the Ebro river and its tributari ...

. The larger-scale Ibercivis infrastructure has been used for a variety of calculating applications, including nuclear fusion research,

protein folding Protein folding is the physical process by which a protein chain is translated to its native three-dimensional structure, typically a "folded" conformation by which the protein becomes biologically functional. Via an expeditious and reproduci ...

and materials simulations. In July 2009, the Ibercivis platform was extended to Portugal following an agreement signed by the governments of both countries during the Luso-Spanish Summit held in Zamora, Spain, in January 2009. Several Portuguese institutions subsequently affiliated themselves with Ibercivis, including the

Ministry of Science A Science Ministry or Department of Science is a ministry or other government agency charged with science. The ministry is often headed by a Minister for Science. List of Ministries of Science Many countries have a Ministry of Science or Ministry ...

, the

Centre for Neuroscience and Cell Biology The Centre for Neuroscience and Cell Biology (CNC) is a nonprofit research institute founded in 1990, aiming to foster research in biomedicine and biotechnology and multidisciplinary graduate teaching at the University of Coimbra. CNC was the f ...

at the

University of Coimbra The University of Coimbra (UC; pt, Universidade de Coimbra, ) is a Public university, public research university in Coimbra, Portugal. First established in Lisbon in 1290, it went through a number of relocations until moving permanently to Coi ...

, and the LIP experimental

high-energy physics Particle physics or high energy physics is the study of fundamental particles and forces that constitute matter and radiation. The fundamental particles in the universe are classified in the Standard Model as fermions (matter particles) and b ...

laboratory. In April 2020, a new Ibercivis project was launched to support researchers efforts to fight

Coronavirus disease 2019 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickly ...

Number of participants

At its inception in June 2008, Ibercivis had 3,000 registered users hosting its various projects. By December 2012, this figure had risen to over 19,800, distributed across 124 countries. There were around 55,000 individual hosting devices registered with the project, of which over 3,600 were active on a weekly basis. As of April 2020, there were 917 active users and 2375 active hosts in the new inception of Ibercivis.

Projects

Ibercivis was intended to run indefinitely, and is designed to run several simultaneous applications belonging to different scientific disciplines in a manner similar to

World Community Grid World Community Grid (WCG) is an effort to create the world's largest volunteer computing platform to tackle scientific research that benefits humanity. Launched on November 16, 2004, with proprietary Grid MP client from United Devices and adding ...

. Users can select which projects they wish to contribute to via the project's website. As of May 2020, Ibercivis encompassed eight different active projects:

Active Projects

COVID-Phym: Screen existing drugs for antiviral activity against

, the causative agent of the

Completed projects

Ibercivis projects that have been completed or discontinued as of May 2020 include: * Fusion: a star on your screen: this application helped scientists at the Research Center for Energy Environment and Technology (CIEMAT) and at the Institute for Biocomputation and Physics of Complex Systems (BIFI) perform simulations of the

plasma Plasma or plasm may refer to: Science * Plasma (physics), one of the four fundamental states of matter * Plasma (mineral), a green translucent silica mineral * Quark–gluon plasma, a state of matter in quantum chromodynamics Biology * Blood pla ...

s that will be produced in the

International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor ITER (initially the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, ''iter'' meaning "the way" or "the path" in Latin) is an international nuclear fusion research and engineering megaproject aimed at creating energy by replicating, on Earth ...

(ITER). The ITER project, which will begin operation in 2018, seeks to make

nuclear fusion power Fusion power is a proposed form of power generation that would generate electricity by using heat from nuclear fusion reactions. In a fusion process, two lighter atomic nuclei combine to form a heavier nucleus, while releasing energy. Devices des ...

a reality, replicating on Earth conditions typically found inside stars. * Docking: looking for anti-cancer drugs: the Docking application assisted the search for new medicines through the simulation of

protein docking Macromolecular docking is the computational modelling of the protein quaternary structure, quaternary structure of complex (chemistry), complexes formed by two or more interacting macromolecule, biological macromolecules. Protein–protein complexe ...

. The Bioinformatics Unit of the Centro de Biología Molecular Severo Ochoa ( CSIC-UAM) developed a platform to allow the automatic simulation of interactions of proteins and small molecules. Its purpose was to find effective drugs to treat serious illnesses, such as

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

. * Materials: simulation of magnetic systems: the Materials application aided physicists from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Universidad de Extremadura and the Institute for Biocomputation and Physics of Complex Systems in discovering how non-magnetic impurities in

magnetic Magnetism is the class of physical attributes that are mediated by a magnetic field, which refers to the capacity to induce attractive and repulsive phenomena in other entities. Electric currents and the magnetic moments of elementary particle ...

materials modify the properties of their transition from a magnetic state to a non-magnetic one. The knowledge of these transitions is important not only from a theoretical point of view but also may help develop many fields of

technology Technology is the application of knowledge to reach practical goals in a specifiable and reproducible way. The word ''technology'' may also mean the product of such an endeavor. The use of technology is widely prevalent in medicine, science, ...

, such as magnetic hard disks and superconducting materials. * Nanoluz: light at a nanoscale: knowing how

light Light or visible light is electromagnetic radiation that can be perceived by the human eye. Visible light is usually defined as having wavelengths in the range of 400–700 nanometres (nm), corresponding to frequencies of 750–420 tera ...

reacts at a

nanometer 330px, Different lengths as in respect to the molecular scale. The nanometre (international spelling as used by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures; SI symbol: nm) or nanometer (American and British English spelling differences#-re ...

scale is a scientific challenge with important implications for the construction of new materials, development of new computing and communication systems and the improvement of technologies such as

solar panels A solar cell panel, solar electric panel, photo-voltaic (PV) module, PV panel or solar panel is an assembly of photovoltaic solar cells mounted in a (usually rectangular) frame, and a neatly organised collection of PV panels is called a phot ...

. Using the Nanoluz application, scientists at the Institute of Optics Daza Valdés CSIC investigated the behavior of light in metal

nanoparticles A nanoparticle or ultrafine particle is usually defined as a particle of matter that is between 1 and 100 nanometres (nm) in diameter. The term is sometimes used for larger particles, up to 500 nm, or fibers and tubes that are less than 1 ...

, seeking to develop systems that could simplify medical and biological analysis. * IberNet: let's research inside Ibercivis: with this project, researchers sought to study and represent the structure of Ibercivis as a

social network A social network is a social structure made up of a set of social actors (such as individuals or organizations), sets of dyadic ties, and other social interactions between actors. The social network perspective provides a set of methods for an ...

and try to export their conclusions to other social networks, to help with the study and prediction of the dynamics of a mass social environment. *Amiloide: searching for drugs against neurodegenerative amyloid diseases: the AMILOIDE project aims to search digital libraries of millions of compounds for potential drugs to interfere with the formation of aggregates and amyloid fibers, which can lead to neurodegenerative diseases. Currently, the main target diseases being studied are familial amyloid polyneuropathy (FAP) and

Alzheimer's disease Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegeneration, neurodegenerative disease that usually starts slowly and progressively worsens. It is the cause of 60–70% of cases of dementia. The most common early symptom is difficulty in short-term me ...

. This project is the responsibility of scientists of the Structural and Computational Biology Group at the Center for Neuroscience and Cell Biology (CNC) of the

. *Neurosim: an immersion in the molecular structure of memory: scientists at the Institute of Matter Structure, CSIC use the results of the Neurosim application to analyze the structural properties of

amino acids Amino acids are organic compounds that contain both amino and carboxylic acid functional groups. Although hundreds of amino acids exist in nature, by far the most important are the alpha-amino acids, which comprise proteins. Only 22 alpha am ...

and small

peptides Peptides (, ) are short chains of amino acids linked by peptide bonds. Long chains of amino acids are called proteins. Chains of fewer than twenty amino acids are called oligopeptides, and include dipeptides, tripeptides, and tetrapeptides. A p ...

(sequences of a few tens of amino acids) that act in the human

brain A brain is an organ that serves as the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals. It is located in the head, usually close to the sensory organs for senses such as vision. It is the most complex organ in a v ...

and

nervous system In biology, the nervous system is the highly complex part of an animal that coordinates its actions and sensory information by transmitting signals to and from different parts of its body. The nervous system detects environmental changes th ...

. By simulating the so-called energy landscape for each amino acid, key steps can be made in reconstructing the three-dimensional structure of proteins from the amino acid sequence, advancing the study of the structure and function of the human brain. *Adsorption: behaviour of confined fluids in limited spaces: the Adsorption application helps researchers from the Instituto de Química-Física Rocasolano from CSIC study the

adsorption Adsorption is the adhesion of atoms, ions or molecules from a gas, liquid or dissolved solid to a surface. This process creates a film of the ''adsorbate'' on the surface of the ''adsorbent''. This process differs from absorption, in which a f ...

properties of the pillared clays that are widely used as industrial catalysers, materials for gas storage, and industrial separation agents. This kind of clay is used in industrial processes such as the production of

biofuel Biofuel is a fuel that is produced over a short time span from biomass, rather than by the very slow natural processes involved in the formation of fossil fuels, such as oil. According to the United States Energy Information Administration (E ...

s from vegetable oils, the storage of

natural gas Natural gas (also called fossil gas or simply gas) is a naturally occurring mixture of gaseous hydrocarbons consisting primarily of methane in addition to various smaller amounts of other higher alkanes. Low levels of trace gases like carbo ...

at room temperature and the storage of

greenhouse gas A greenhouse gas (GHG or GhG) is a gas that Absorption (electromagnetic radiation), absorbs and Emission (electromagnetic radiation), emits radiant energy within the thermal infrared range, causing the greenhouse effect. The primary greenhouse ...

es produced by industry. *Cuanticables: quantic wires simulations: scientists of the

University of Buenos Aires The University of Buenos Aires ( es, Universidad de Buenos Aires, UBA) is a public university, public research university in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Established in 1821, it is the premier institution of higher learning in the country and one o ...

use this application to study the degree to which the faults in the material of quantum wires has on their

electric current An electric current is a stream of charged particles, such as electrons or ions, moving through an electrical conductor or space. It is measured as the net rate of flow of electric charge through a surface or into a control volume. The moving pa ...

. For this purpose, they develop a theoretical model which simulates the quantum wire, the impurities and the

electrode An electrode is an electrical conductor used to make contact with a nonmetallic part of a circuit (e.g. a semiconductor, an electrolyte, a vacuum or air). Electrodes are essential parts of batteries that can consist of a variety of materials de ...

s to which the quantum wire connects, and study the behaviour of the current that is generated across the wire when an external voltage is applied to it. *Sanidad: improved diagnostics:

ionizing radiation Ionizing radiation (or ionising radiation), including nuclear radiation, consists of subatomic particles or electromagnetic waves that have sufficient energy to ionize atoms or molecules by detaching electrons from them. Some particles can travel ...

is used in health applications ranging from basic

diagnostic Diagnosis is the identification of the nature and cause of a certain phenomenon. Diagnosis is used in many different disciplines, with variations in the use of logic, analytics, and experience, to determine " cause and effect". In systems engine ...

tests in a modern hospital (in

radiology Radiology ( ) is the medical discipline that uses medical imaging to diagnose diseases and guide their treatment, within the bodies of humans and other animals. It began with radiography (which is why its name has a root referring to radiat ...

nuclear medicine Nuclear medicine or nucleology is a medical specialty involving the application of radioactive substances in the diagnosis and treatment of disease. Nuclear imaging, in a sense, is "radiology done inside out" because it records radiation emitting ...

and laboratory tests) to the treatment of cancer by

radiotherapy Radiation therapy or radiotherapy, often abbreviated RT, RTx, or XRT, is a therapy using ionizing radiation, generally provided as part of cancer treatment to control or kill malignant cells and normally delivered by a linear accelerator. Radia ...

. For these purposes, both actual

radioactive material A radionuclide (radioactive nuclide, radioisotope or radioactive isotope) is a nuclide that has excess nuclear energy, making it unstable. This excess energy can be used in one of three ways: emitted from the nucleus as gamma radiation; transfer ...

s (in the form of seeds or injectable material) and complex equipment that generates

photon A photon () is an elementary particle that is a quantum of the electromagnetic field, including electromagnetic radiation such as light and radio waves, and the force carrier for the electromagnetic force. Photons are massless, so they always ...

beams and

electron The electron ( or ) is a subatomic particle with a negative one elementary electric charge. Electrons belong to the first generation of the lepton particle family, and are generally thought to be elementary particles because they have no kn ...

s can be utilised. Physicists from Andalucía use the Sanidad simulations to improve knowledge of the safe use of radiation in healthcare, and to explore potential new applications. *Criticalidad: electron transport in disordered systems with fractal properties: the Criticalidad project helps

Mexican Mexican may refer to: Mexico and its culture *Being related to, from, or connected to the country of Mexico, in North America ** People *** Mexicans, inhabitants of the country Mexico and their descendants *** Mexica, ancient indigenous people ...

investigators understand the properties and effects of

fractal In mathematics, a fractal is a geometric shape containing detailed structure at arbitrarily small scales, usually having a fractal dimension strictly exceeding the topological dimension. Many fractals appear similar at various scales, as illu ...

ity in the transport of

s through disordered systems in the Anderson transition. *Soluvel: researching solubility of toxic and pharmaceutical compounds: the aim of the Soluvel project is to calculate the

solvation Solvation (or dissolution) describes the interaction of a solvent with dissolved molecules. Both ionized and uncharged molecules interact strongly with a solvent, and the strength and nature of this interaction influence many properties of the ...

energies of certain soluble compounds, so as to identify through computation which compounds may prove toxic to humans, and which may serve as effective medical drugs. The project is being conducted by researchers from the Laboratory of Molecular Simulation of Separation and Reaction Engineering (LSRE), a division of the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto. *Primalidad: search for Wilson primes: a "citizen science" project open to all mathematicians, the Primalidad application searches for the next

Wilson prime In number theory, a Wilson prime is a prime number p such that p^2 divides (p-1)!+1, where "!" denotes the factorial function; compare this with Wilson's theorem, which states that every prime p divides (p-1)!+1. Both are named for 18th-century E ...

– the first three having been 5, 13 and 563. It is conjectured that the fourth Wilson prime must be larger than 5 × 10⁸.Ibercivis.pt - Primalidad
. Retrieved 2011-10-15.

References

External links

*
Official Portuguese website

Official Spanish website

Ibercivis - BOINC Spanish website

Ibercivis - BOINC Portuguese website

BIFI - Institute of Complex Systems Biocomputing and Physics

Centre for Neuroscience and Cell Biology

University of Zaragoza

CIEMAT - Centro de Investigationes Energeticas, Medioambientales y Tecnologicas

ITER - International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ibercivis Science in society Free science software Volunteer computing projects Cross-platform free software