Solve puzzles for science
August 16, 2008 8:15 PM Subscribe
Solve puzzles for science. Finding the best shape for a protein is one of the hardest problems in biology today. Even with computers, there are so many degrees of freedom that current methods take a lot of money and time. The game foldit lets humans compete against each other folding proteins to try to find good shapes. Some of the shapes you form may eventually lead to curing diseases such as HIV/AIDS, cancer, and Alzheimer's. Humans frequently have intuitive approaches to folding that can lead to better and faster results than brute force enumeration of all the different possibilities. Besides helping cure diseases, playing this game is addictive and fun. If you liked tetris, this may be your game, and you might just win a Nobel prize for playing it.
This post was deleted for the following reason: i can't decide between the bad "double-helix" joke or the worse "protein shake" joke so I'm going to just admit defeat here and move on with my evening. -- cortex
Are double posts acceptable if they cure cancer?
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 8:30 PM on August 16, 2008
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 8:30 PM on August 16, 2008
Nope. Like I used to say on RASFW, if Jesus Christ himself posted step by step instructions on how to live forever, above the material he was quoting I would tell him.
A) Stop fucking top posting
and
B) Stop spamming the newsgroup.
Rules is rules.
posted by Justinian at 8:45 PM on August 16, 2008
A) Stop fucking top posting
and
B) Stop spamming the newsgroup.
Rules is rules.
posted by Justinian at 8:45 PM on August 16, 2008
I searched for fold.it (the url of the main page), and it returned nothing. Guess I should have removed the period.
posted by Xoc at 8:53 PM on August 16, 2008
posted by Xoc at 8:53 PM on August 16, 2008
That's okay. It does happen, you know (glares at the poo-pooers), that some of us slower MeFites miss the original post. So thanks for this!
posted by zardoz at 9:33 PM on August 16, 2008
posted by zardoz at 9:33 PM on August 16, 2008
After some months it should not be counted as double post.
posted by zouhair at 9:58 PM on August 16, 2008
posted by zouhair at 9:58 PM on August 16, 2008
Aside from this being a double, which Mefites seem to think is the most important thing about a post about trying to cure cancer and a host of other diseases...
Anyone tried this? Is it interesting enough to keep doing? Likelihood of this changing the world?
posted by Kickstart70 at 10:29 PM on August 16, 2008
Anyone tried this? Is it interesting enough to keep doing? Likelihood of this changing the world?
posted by Kickstart70 at 10:29 PM on August 16, 2008
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posted by TypographicalError at 8:25 PM on August 16, 2008