Online games are being used for research in ways that are really having a huge impact!
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.
Photo by AFP
The exploit is published on Sunday in the journal Nature Structural & Molecular Biology, where — exceptionally in scientific publishing — both gamers and researchers are honoured as co-authors.
Their target was a monomeric protease enzyme, a cutting agent in the complex molecular tailoring of retroviruses, a family that includes HIV.
Figuring out the structure of proteins is vital for understanding the causes of many diseases and developing drugs to block them.
But a microscope gives only a flat image of what to the outsider looks like a plate of one-dimensional scrunched-up spaghetti. Pharmacologists, though, need a 3-D picture that “unfolds” the molecule and rotates it in order to reveal potential targets for drugs.
From Yahoo News: http://games.yahoo.com/blogs/plugged-in/online-gamers-crack-aids-enzyme-puzzle-161920724.html;_ylc=X3oDMTNtczRvcjZnBF9TAzU2NzAwMTEyNQRhY3QDbWFpbF9jYgRjdANhBGludGwDdXMEbGFuZwNlbi1VUwRwa2cDNWM1YWExY2UtNmQwNS0zYThiLTk1YzUtOTYwZmY3MDc5ZmRmBHNlYwNtaXRfc2hhcmUEc2xrA21haWwEdGVzdAM-