Bitfury donates its powerful computers to COVID-19 research

The Bitfury Group has become the latest company in the blockchain industry to contribute its computing power to COVID-19 research. The blockchain technology company donated its high-powered GPU-enabled computing nodes to the Folding at Home research project.

While announcing the donation, Bitfury revealed that its computers have already started crunching the computations for the Folding at Home project. Since March 20, they have completed more than 1,300 calculations related to COVID-19 research. The Amsterdam, Netherlands-based company intends on scaling up its contribution over time.

The Folding at Home initiative is led by the Washington University, with support from other scientific research labs in North America, Asia and Europe. It pools together computing power from donors to run computer simulations, analyzing some of the diseases that have troubled the world. Recently, its research on the Ebola virus helped scientists to understand it better and even develop effective drugs. It’s now focusing all its efforts on the novel coronavirus.  

Bitfury CEO Valery Vavilov said the donation stems from the company’s core mission which is to do good. He further commended the efforts of those in the frontline against the lethal virus, stating “Our contribution of highly efficient computing power pales next to the selflessness and sacrifice of our medical caregivers and essential staff on the front lines of this virus, but I am confident that this project from Folding at Home, alongside the work of many researchers and doctors, will significantly advance our understanding and treatment of this disease.”

The company further called on anyone with excess computing power to donate and play his part in ridding the world of the virus.

We strongly encourage anyone with spare computing power to join the @foldingathome project with us to help fight #COVID19. In the meantime, please everyone #StayHomeStaySafe. https://t.co/XufffVJxYj

— The Bitfury Group (@BitfuryGroup) April 1, 2020

Bitfury becomes the latest blockchain company to donate its computing power to aid in coronavirus research. At a time when the medical sector needs all the help it can get, the blockchain world has shown that it can stand up to be counted. Just recently, CoreWeave, an American digital currency miner donated over 6,000 GPU machines to the same project. These GPUs mined 28 ETH in a day, generating the firm about $3,600.

Tezos also chipped in, with its community contributing $1,000 as prize money for the user who contributes the most amount of computing power to Folding at Home. Gitcoin, a blockchain crowdfunding platform pledged about $50,000 in grants towards coronavirus research, stating that it has set its target at $100,000.