# Online gamers crack AIDS enzyme puzzle



## LauraMJ (Mar 18, 2004)

> Online gamers have achieved a feat beyond the realm of Second Life or Dungeons and Dragons: they have deciphered the structure of an enzyme of an AIDS-like virus that had thwarted scientists for a decade............To the astonishment of the scientists, the gamers produced an accurate model of the enzyme in just three weeks.


:up::up:

http://games.yahoo.com/blogs/plugged-in/online-gamers-crack-aids-enzyme-puzzle-161920724.html


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## eddie5659 (Mar 19, 2001)

Looks like there is a future for us gamers :up:


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## LauraMJ (Mar 18, 2004)

Yes, indeed.

I thought that was truly awesome.


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## Ent (Apr 11, 2009)

So they hand a bunch of nerds an unsolved riddle and call it a game, and then they come back a few weeks later for the answer. Sounds like a neat scheme to me.


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## eddie5659 (Mar 19, 2001)

I think I may sign up to this, wonder if they have any places left


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## eddie5659 (Mar 19, 2001)

And here it is!!!

http://fold.it/

oooo, and they're looking at H2N2 Flu Design.

This is fantastic, thanks for the link Laura :up:


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## Firebreather (Jul 8, 2011)

Time to give cancer a hard time...


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## LauraMJ (Mar 18, 2004)

eddie5659 said:


> And here it is!!!
> 
> http://fold.it/
> 
> ...


You're welcome. If you make any huge scientific breakthroughs, be sure to let us know.


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## ekim68 (Jul 8, 2003)

Ent said:


> So they hand a bunch of nerds an unsolved riddle and call it a game, and then they come back a few weeks later for the answer. Sounds like a neat scheme to me.


Probably the best scheme...:up:


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## nittiley (Aug 15, 2011)

This is fascinating; thanks for posting it!


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## eddie5659 (Mar 19, 2001)

New computer, so downloading this program now, and will let you know how it goes


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## LauraMJ (Mar 18, 2004)

Yes, keep us updated!


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## nittiley (Aug 15, 2011)

wonder if fold-it will end up needing its own soapbox


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## valis (Sep 24, 2004)

eddie5659 said:


> New computer, so downloading this program now, and will let you know how it goes


let me know how that beasty handles the stress...are you going to set up 24 hour monitoring for when you are not using it? Be interesting to see how much it stresses the rig out.


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## eddie5659 (Mar 19, 2001)

Well, the program itself is easy to use, but don't just think you can just jump in solving the aids virus etc. You have tutorials first, and they're difficult. Stuck on joining sheets together, as I need to create the hydrogen bonds.

However, a developer for the tool has pointed me in the right direction, so testing it tomorrow.


I also think this beasty will handle it juuuust fine


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## valis (Sep 24, 2004)

I would imagine so as well......

I used to assist with a parallel (dunno why, still call them that; I guess _shared_ would be a more accurate term) astronomy app waaaaaaaaaay back when.....late 90's with U of Oregon. I remember I had some behemoth 5 gig hard drive, and actually got a call from someone when I signed up, as they were pretty certain it was a typo.


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## eddie5659 (Mar 19, 2001)

Okay, still plodding thru the tutorials, but I tried to explain this to someone who is a chemist. They just stared at it, and couldn't see what I was talking about.

I explained its all about the score, as you can see at the top. As a gamer, we can get very competitive if someone has a higher score, so we want to be better. So, I showed her that by dragging the sheets (the ones that look like er sheets, but with pegs attached) closer together, and creating so hydrogen bonds, the score goes up. But, do it too much, and it becomes unstable, and the score goes down.

Basically, I can pretty much guarantee that 90% of those doing the puzzles have no idea what they're looking at, as in Aids, H1N1 etc, but getting the idea on creating a stable compound to get a higher score, they will get 

So, in this one and only screenshot off my puzzles, you can see the bonds (hydrogen ones in blue). There are receptor's and donor's as well, need one to bind to the other.

The big red blobs are basically popping when it becomes unstable, or just moving closer together, and staying still-ish, if stable.

Hope that explains what I'm trying to say....in english


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## Elvandil (Aug 1, 2003)

There's a similar story about a scientist who had tried multiple methods of creating ultra-fine circuits on surfaces. Try as he might, he couldn't come up with a method that produced fine enough results. Then one night late in his office, he had an idea. The next morning he produced the fully-configured circuit to his colleagues, much to their amazement. It turned out that all he had done is fill the ink cartridge in his printer with the circuit material. The printer companies had solved his problem long ago, but just never thought of using it for that purpose.

That gaming story is interesting because I doubt that any gamer set out to solve the puzzle, _per se_. Chances are that he unravelled the algorithm in order to cheat and win the competition in the game.


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## Ent (Apr 11, 2009)

Elvandil said:


> That gaming story is interesting because I doubt that any gamer set out to solve the puzzle, _per se_. Chances are that he unravelled the algorithm in order to cheat and win the competition in the game.


That doesn't actually work for one really simple reason: Nobody had the answer. Sure, if you're playing a text adventure game you can decompile it and find out all the magic words and maps the programmer planted for you. In this case scientists had been trying to get the _magic word_ themselves for a decade, and had no success, so you can bet anything you like it wasn't secretly hidden in the code. The program compares the gamer's proposed structure with the observed properties of the enzyme they're after, it doesn't actually have a structure it wants to get out.


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