Gamers Pave The Way For A New AIDS Drug

Gamers have succeded where scientists have failed. It's been over a decade since scientists have set out to break down a protein called protease that allows AIDS to multiply. Three weeks ago scientists reached out to the University of Washington's program "Foldit" which takes science figures and turns them into competitive games.

"People have spatial reasoning skills, something computers are not yet good at. 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." Seth Cooper, Co-Creator of "Foldit"

It took the student gamers a little over three weeks to build models of the protease protein and scientists have hopes of being able to use their computer models to aid them in developing new HIV drugs.

"The ingenuity of game players is a formidable force that, if properly directed, can be used to solve a wide range of scientific problems." Firas Khatib, lead study author

See media gaming haters, we can put our powers to good use.

via Fox News

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