Gamer's Help Decipher AIDS Causing Virus

Foldit is an online puzzle video game about protein folding. The game is part of an experimental research project, and is developed by the University of Washington's Center for Game Science in collaboration with the UW Department of Biochemistry. The objective of the game is to fold the structure of selected proteins as well as possible, using various tools provided within the game. The highest scoring solutions are analysed by researchers, who determine whether or not there is a native structural configuration (or native state) that can be applied to the relevant proteins, in the "real world". Scientists can then use such solutions to solve "real-world" problems, by targeting and eradicating diseases, and creating biological innovations.

In 2011, players of Foldit helped to decipher the crystal structure of the Mason-Pfizer monkey virus (M-PMV) retroviral protease, an AIDS-causing monkey virus. While the puzzle was available to play for a period of three weeks, players produced an accurate 3D model of the enzyme in just ten days. The problem of how to configure the structure of the enzyme had been an unaccomplished goal of scientists for 15 years.[7][8]
In January, 2012, Scientific American reported that the Foldit gamers achieved the first crowdsourced redesign of a protein.[6] The protein is an enzyme which catalyses the Diels-Alder reactions widely used in synthetic chemistry. A team including David Baker in the Center for Game Science at University of Washington in Seattle computationally designed this enzyme from scratch but found the potency needing improvement. The Foldit players reengineered the enzyme by adding 13 amino acids and increased its activity by more than 18 times.[6][9]

This is Amazing to me ! i really haven't much to say . i came across this on another site and i thought i would share it with ATS.

And as one poster put it

In general, I think that this type of occurrence is a testament to why modern communication, especially the internet, will push us to our next stage of understanding as a species.

right you are buddy !

LINK

gota bookmark this all the flak gammers get for being fat lazzy and unproductive wasting there life away on games

yea now what

If you think how fast a virus can mutate, or how slowly humans take to evolve one generation, imagine the speed at which a whole crowd of internet gamers can play. Even if someone just played once and added, moved or deleted a few amino acids here and there, every change is equivalent to one or more generation. Multiply that by thousands if not hundreds of thousands and that's the equivalent of a million years of evolution.

originally posted by: markovian
gota bookmark this all the flak gammers get for being fat lazzy and unproductive wasting there life away on games

yea now what

lol , Exactly !

this is proof that gaming can be productive

originally posted by: stormcell
If you think how fast a virus can mutate, or how slowly humans take to evolve one generation, imagine the speed at which a whole crowd of internet gamers can play. Even if someone just played once and added, moved or deleted a few amino acids here and there, every change is equivalent to one or more generation. Multiply that by thousands if not hundreds of thousands and that's the equivalent of a million years of evolution.

hey good thinking , or what if we had computers to do it for us ?

I always thought this was a great app on the PS3 and I wondered if a lot of diseases can be fought this way. It took gamers only 3 weeks to solve a 15 yr old scientists problem... I'm sure gamers could cure cancer in a month if big pharma would allow it...

This is a few years old now, its not breaking news

A few questions that comes to mind is who ends up with the patents as commercial applications are developed? Does the game designer or players get any benefits or recognition? Or is it more open source, does anyone get to build their own protein chains as long as they have enough skill and experience to do it? How will any such agreements legally hold up and what is the world to do as these new tools continue to expand our capabilities?

This is absolutely fascinating! Thank you for sharing!

I'm on ATS almost constantly digging for interesting updates and were it not for your kindness I never would have known about this innovative and positive use of game-play technology. Better late than never, right?

originally posted by: PhoenixOD
This is a few years old now, its not breaking news

that's why i didn't put it in "breaking news "

originally posted by: kwakakev
A few questions that comes to mind is who ends up with the patents as commercial applications are developed? Does the game designer or players get any benefits or recognition? Or is it more open source, does anyone get to build their own protein chains as long as they have enough skill and experience to do it? How will any such agreements legally hold up and what is the world to do as these new tools continue to expand our capabilities?

Improving future generations and your race as a whole should not be profitable, but of course there are people in the world that turn to greed (pharma corporations mainly)

a reply to: cruddas

dont live in a capitalist society then.

a reply to: cruddas

I do not think many people have a problem with a fair reward for fair work, as for how to define and counter the exploitation and cracks in the system is an issue.

Global copyright and patent law are still a bit of a mix, better standardization has been a part of the ongoing free trade agreements. As for how this technology fits into the current situation does further compound the complexity of the situation as DNA has become a patentable property. One part of the DNA chain that is clearly understood is how it encodes proteins, or all the little machines that makes your cells work.

Being able to unfold proteins also means knowing how to encode proteins in DNA. While in the short term as we learn more about the language of life, having specific proteins limited under the corporate umbrella can help in managing any unforeseen fallout.

In the longer term, I am not sure if it is god, the universe or something else that first discovered and developed DNA. But who or what ever it was owns the patent to DNA, not anyone of us. The way this DNA program has been running it is searching for a better way.