Supercomputing to allow for creation of avatars for scientific testing
With this personalized ‘virtual copy’, doctors will be able to test patients’ reactions to different drugs as of 2020.
We are accumulating an ever-growing amount of information. So much so that the development of computers can't keep pace with the amount of data obtained through scientific research. Experts in supercomputing that participated in the scientific debates Towards in silico humans. A challenge for Exascale computing area in Barcelona —organized by B·Debate, the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC-CNS) and the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona)— predict that the supercomputers of the future, based on exascale technology, will be able to carry out one trillion (one million billions) calculations per second with a speed one thousand times greater than the fastest machines available today.
Simulation has become the third pillar of science, alongside theory and experimentation. Modeling and simulation are opening up many new applications in the life sciences. According to the scientific leader of this B·Debate event, Dr. Modesto Orozco, "in the future each of us will have a sort of avatar, which doctors will be able to use to test our reaction to drugs, among other things."
Scientists have been able to simulate both molecules and whole organs. For example, the team led by Dr. José María Cela of the BSC has created a simulated heart with its corresponding blood flow, mechanical muscle and electrical conduction. This model allows them to study, among other things, the effects of drugs on disorders like arrhythmias.
Another important project currently underway is the Human Brain Project, funded by the European Union and led by Dr. Henry Markram, which will use technology to reproduce the characteristics of the human brain. In diseases with high social impact, like Alzheimer and cancer, breakthroughs are still in the early stages.
More information is available on the B·Debate website.
- Related news (19 September 2013)
- Related press release (12 September 2013)
- News on other B·Debate activities
Follow the debate on Twitter @BDebate with the hashtag #BDebate
| Organizers: |
|
| Collaborators: |
   |