First of all congrats! A big point for gamers around the world for this one. For over a decade scientists have been hard at work trying to figure out ways to figure and map out the structure a AIDS-like enzyme called Mason-Pfizer monkey virus (M-PMV), a close relative of HIV that causes AIDS in monkeys. After three weeks of mapping out the entire enzyme through a program/game called FoldIt, which was developed in 2008 by the University of Washington, scientists were able to figure out where throughout the structure would be the key place to attach possible drug treatments to find a cure. Reasons why Folding was created was to use human spatial reasoning skills to configure amino acid chains and unfold their structures.
If you’re wondering why this process can’t be automated by computers it’s because computers aren’t as capable of spatial reasoning skills as well as humans are. Although scientist have used a program called the Rosetta programme which can solve many different types of protein chains.
Who said gaming was bad for your health?
[Source Discover Magazine]
