Wow I never thought I'd see the day when the scientific community was nuts about a video game and a couple gamers. For over a decade AIDS researchers have been studying the AIDS virus to figure out the protein and molecular structure, but they are always faced with a huge problem. The researchers could only see the virus in 2D using a microscope. But in order for scientists to find a cure they need a 3D view.
Well a video game called Foldit developed by the University of Washington challenges gamers to take Amino acids and unfold them to build blocks of protein. The game was meant to help educate students and students seemed to enjoy playing it. The University said "The ingenuity of game players is a formidable force that, if properly directed, can be used to solve a wide range of scientific problems." leading one of the creators of the game Seth Cooper to say "People have spatial reasoning skills, something computers are not yet good at,".
By figuring out the proteins and molecular structure of the AID's virus gamers did in three weeks what scientists have been trying for a very long time. Seth finished in saying that "Games provide a framework for bringing together the strengths of computers and humans. The results in this week's paper show that gaming, science and computation can be combined to make advances that were not possible before."
So don't worry world all the questions in science shall soon be answered, not by Scientists working in labs but by N00bs pwning your ass!
-JC7
"In God We Trust - In Games We Play " - Joel Reimer
