http://www.cmu.edu/news/stories/archives/2014/october/october6_massiveonlinelabs.html
"Scientific rigor through videogames" (commentary)
"RNA design rules from a massive open laboratory" (Full Text)
Scientists have used video games as a way to combat common types of scientific fraud (data manipulation, lack of reproducibility) by using a community of non-experts to carry out large-scale experiments and assist with advancing algorithm design.
The EteRNA project connects 37,000 enthusiasts to RNA design puzzles through an online interface. Uniquely, EteRNA participants not only manipulate simulated molecules but also control a remote experimental pipeline for high-throughput RNA synthesis and structure mapping. We show herein that the EteRNA community leveraged dozens of cycles of continuous wet laboratory feedback to learn strategies for solving in vitro RNA design problems on which automated methods fail. The top strategies—including several previously unrecognized negative design rules—were distilled by machine learning into an algorithm, EteRNABot. Over a rigorous 1-y testing phase, both the EteRNA community and EteRNABot significantly outperformed prior algorithms in a dozen RNA secondary structure design tests, including the creation of dendrimer-like structures and scaffolds for small molecule sensors. These results show that an online community can carry out large-scale experiments, hypothesis generation, and algorithm design to create practical advances in empirical science.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 09 2014, @02:03AM
I wish I had a great comment on the topic but the article is complete , uncontroversial and advance the state of the art... What else can be said?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 09 2014, @02:31AM
I am a scientist and I can't really figure out what this is all about. It sounds like they come up with some sort of game interface that lets one work on various folding configurations, sort of like a bunch of people playing 3-D Tetris. It seems you sort of random walk through parameter space. It would seem to work OK for situations where you are looking at a huge combinatorics problems or huge data sets amenable to pattern searching. I think it is disingenuous to talk about "citizen scientists"; I think it is pretty patronizing. When I used to run Seti-at-home on my computer, I didn't consider me or my computer a "citizen scientist" regardless of whether my results were being used.
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Thursday October 09 2014, @05:37AM
and of course it assumes the energy/score function is correct, otherwise it is a random walk over a phase space with some of the minima chosen.
Sounds like away of avoiding to pay for post-docs...
(Score: 2) by jcross on Thursday October 09 2014, @03:17PM
I believe the participants are doing a bit more than just donating their processors to be part of a SETI@home or folding@home cluster. As I understand it, they're actively designing molecules, which are then fabricated in the lab, and adjusting them based on test results. The collective insight of the community is then used to infer design rules that can be automated. I would actually call the participants citizen scientists in this case, or at least citizen bio-engineers or something. They've put in a lot of time (collectively 2 million person-hours) developing an intuitive understanding of RNA design, which is not your everyday type of know-how.