The cryptocurrency craze has caused ripple (no pun intended) effects across nearly every industry. That includes those looking for alien life forms. That’s because the need for GPUs has skyrocketed due to cryptocurrency mining, and now scientists are having a hard time getting the equipment they need.
Researchers at SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) are looking to expand their search at a couple of observatories. However they’ve hid a bit of a road block, and cryptocurrency is to blame.
Both industries require graphics processing units (GPU) to sift through all of the data that comes in. Before the advent of cryptocurrencies, extraterrestrial researchers never had a problem acquiring the latest and greatest GPUs. That’s no longer the case due to the high demand that has been placed on GPUs by cryptocurrency miners.
Mining is how users participate in the process of validating the transactions executed across the cryptocurrency's network. The GPU is connected to a distributed network where it crunches numbers, finding answers to mathematical puzzles. Mining is a difficult task, but it is richly rewarding. Miners are rewarded with a payment in the form of the cryptocurrency they are mining. Many have used this to earn a passive income, while never purchasing any coins.
Both crypto miners and extraterrestrial hunters share the need for a computer processor that can sift through mass amounts of data at lightning speed. For researchers, GPUs are used to sift through the data of sound waves that are pulled in from telescopes. Unfortunately for researchers, the crypto boom has doubled the prices for the needed computers.
Aaron Parsons, a professor at the University of California at Berkeley, commented on the price of GPUs: “We'll be able to weather it but it is coming out of our contingency budget. We're buying a lot of these things, it's going to end up costing about $32,000 extra."
Researchers at SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) are looking to expand their search at a couple of observatories. However they’ve hid a bit of a road block, and cryptocurrency is to blame.
Both industries require graphics processing units (GPU) to sift through all of the data that comes in. Before the advent of cryptocurrencies, extraterrestrial researchers never had a problem acquiring the latest and greatest GPUs. That’s no longer the case due to the high demand that has been placed on GPUs by cryptocurrency miners.
Mining is how users participate in the process of validating the transactions executed across the cryptocurrency's network. The GPU is connected to a distributed network where it crunches numbers, finding answers to mathematical puzzles. Mining is a difficult task, but it is richly rewarding. Miners are rewarded with a payment in the form of the cryptocurrency they are mining. Many have used this to earn a passive income, while never purchasing any coins.
Both crypto miners and extraterrestrial hunters share the need for a computer processor that can sift through mass amounts of data at lightning speed. For researchers, GPUs are used to sift through the data of sound waves that are pulled in from telescopes. Unfortunately for researchers, the crypto boom has doubled the prices for the needed computers.
Aaron Parsons, a professor at the University of California at Berkeley, commented on the price of GPUs: “We'll be able to weather it but it is coming out of our contingency budget. We're buying a lot of these things, it's going to end up costing about $32,000 extra."