Cryptocurrency Mining Is Hampering the Search for E.T.

cryptocurrency mining



GPUs on a cryptocurrency mining rig. (Credit score: Shutterstock)

Mining for cryptocurrencies isn’t simply gobbling up capability on electrical grids around the globe, it may also be slowing the seek for extraterrestrial life.

Mining cryptos like Bitcoin require miners to resolve wickedly complicated mathematical puzzles to validate every transaction. For his or her efforts, miners obtain a small cost for every puzzle they remedy, however the course of requires a crapload of computing energy. To reap income, miners depend on graphics processing items (GPUs) which might be high-performance pc chips that had been first used to energy video video games. Miners have discovered success stringing hundreds of this stuff collectively to maximise their capability to resolve puzzles and make income.

This seemingly insatiable starvation for computing muscle is why crypto miners at the moment are crossing paths with E.T. hunters, in accordance with a report from the BBC. At Seti, radio astronomers need to course of as many frequency channels as potential, as a result of we will’t know which of them a distant civilization may use to ship a sign to different worlds. Meaning there’s a ton of knowledge streaming in from giant arrays.

Dan Werthimer, chief scientist on the Berkley Seti Analysis Heart, informed the BBC they deploy roughly 100 GPUs to investigate information from varied listening arrays. Sadly for them, there’s a scarcity of GPUs as demand has soared.

“We’d like to make use of the newest GPUs [graphics processing units]… and we will’t get ’em,” Werthimer informed the BBC. “That’s limiting our seek for extra-terrestrials, to attempt to reply the query, ‘Are we alone? Is there anyone on the market?’”

And Werthimer isn’t alone. Different radio astronomers are additionally discovering it tough to climate the GPU scarcity and the rising prices that include shortage. For extra on how the GPU scarcity is affecting astronomy analysis, try the remainder of the story from the BBC’s tech reporter, Chris Baraniuk.

(h/t BBC)


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