With COVID-19, aka coronavirus, it continues to spread at an alarming rate, researchers of all strokes are quick to get a handle on it. That includes a team at the University of Washington in Seattle, who have taken a novel approach: a video game.
The game, first released in 2008, is called Folder. In it, players clone proteins to understand their structures, which UW researchers say is "key to understanding how (the protein) works to guide it through drugs." Now they have been added new puzzle in COVID-19-based game. As you expect, as long as there is no vaccine, it presents a unique challenge.
"Coronaviruses show a & # 39; ike protein on their face, which attaches strongly to the receptor protein found on the surface of human cells," reads the puzzle's description (via Eurogamer). "In recent weeks, researchers have discovered how the 2019 coronavirus spike protein interacts with how it interacts with human receptors.
Effectively, Folder scrollworks otherwise can be made entirely by researchers, and are productive; according to the creators of the game, thousands of people are playing, and "they are at least equal and sometimes better than a computer to wrap long amino acid chains into three-dimensional shapes," especially if the problem "requires a straight jump or a change strategy."
At present it is unclear whether this will help to make the global epidemic end, but it is set aside many effort based on traditional computers such as Folding @ Home as our best-equipped thinking tool – or at least decent PCs – you can do to help fight the virus more than 92,000 became infected and killed 3,110, many of whom were old or threatened by the immune system.
Recommended stories
