The objective of this project is to predict the structure of proteins of major strains of rice. The intent is to help farmers breed better rice strains with higher crop yields, promote greater disease and pest resistance, and utilize a full range of bioavailable nutrients that can benefit people around the world, especially in regions where hunger is a critical concern.World Community Grid - Research - Nutritious Rice for the World
Determining the structure of proteins is an extremely difficult and expensive process. However, it is possible to computationally predict a protein's structure from its corresponding DNA sequence. The Computational Biology Research Group at the University of Washington has developed state of the art software to accomplish this. The difficulty is, there are thousands of distinct proteins found in rice. This presents a computational challenge that a single computer cannot solve within a reasonable timeframe. Therefore, volunteers of World Community Grid are invited to assist in this daunting task. Through collaboration with agricultural researchers and farmers, the hope is to eventually improve global rice yields and quality.
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