Real-world results through gaming (Part 2)
Posted: July 18th, 2008 | Author: Steve | Filed under: Technology | Tags: Games, gaming, linkedin, onlinegames, protein, science fiction, simulation | View Comments
Previously, I wrote about how powerful simulations games are, and the potential that they have for helping us navigate through the stormy waters of the early 21st century. Recently, I was discussing this with a friend of mine, and he suggested that I read Ender’s Game, a science-fiction book by Orson Scott Card.
In the book, humanity is faced with destruction at the hands of an alien invasion for, which takes the form of an intelligent, space-faring insectoid race called the Buggers. Unfortunately for the humans, the Buggers have superior numbers and superior tactics. The only thing that can defeat them is a genius military leader, and the only one available is long dead. For some reason that is never elaborated on in the book, the military leadership has decided to find the best and brightest children in the world, and train them to be military geniuses. (it stands to reason that perhaps a large portion of the adult males were wiped out in the prior invasions, or something like that, but it’s never mentioned.) The children selected have savant-level intelligence, ad the method of training involves two different types of simulation games. Without giving too much away, kids and games save the day.
The basic themes of the book are the intelligence and creativity of children, and the power of games as useful tools. There is a unique aspect to games, which is that you can always count on a select few individuals becoming really really good at each particular one. Also, if you design the game correctly, you can solve almost any poblem.
This article outlines how a protein researcher from the University of Washington, David Baker, has discovered the usefulness of games in creating new proteins. Apparently, there are still some things which people are much better at than computers, and designing proteins is one of those.
“Proteins are made up of long strings of amino acids that are folded up into complex three-dimensional tangles with many subregions. The function of a protein is dependent on this three-dimensional structure. One pocket might be ideal for grabbing on to another protein, for example. Other parts of the protein may play a purely supportive, structural role, holding the molecule together. Baker’s new method for creating novel proteins begins with the active sites. Once they’re in place, structural concerns, especially how tightly packed the protein is, determine whether the design is feasible. Figuring out the best way to hold together the active sites is a complicated search problem that requires a lot of processing power. There are a myriad of possibilities, but most won’t work.”
The computer programs take a brute-force approach, trying every possible combination for folding the proteins, and then checking to see if the combination is any good.
“When the computer doesn’t know what the best next step is, it changes the structure randomly. Baker says that he began to wonder whether people working with computers can solve a hard problem that computers can’t solve alone.”
Several people, using Baker’s algorithm, were able to see the steps that the computer needed to take, well before the computer did. Unfortunately, they had no method of providing feedback. Baker teamed up with a game designer, and the result was the game FoldIt, which combines the computer program with human creativity.
“The first several levels of Foldit are designed to teach players what good proteins look like and how to manipulate them using the tools of the game…. For example, it’s good to pack proteins tightly, but not too tightly: electrical charges in different regions of the side chains will repel each other if they’re too close to each other….After improving the designs of a few test proteins, players can advance into competitive play, working in teams or alone.”
Baker proposes that, like Ender’s Game, FoldIt has an interesting added benefit: discovering “protein savants”:
“By making the game available to anyone over the Web, the researchers expect to find people they call protein savants–people who are very good at solving protein structures and who will spend several hours a week playing the game.”
People who are gamers themselves or have family members, especially teenagers, who are are probaby quite familiar with this phenomenon. Just think about the number of kids out there who spend hours, and sometimes days playing World of Warcraft, Call of Duty or Halo 3. The video gaming industry made over $17.9 billion in 2007, with over 217 milion people playing online games!
Now, just imagine if your son could find a cure for cancer, while playing Halo 6 with his buddies! Wouldn’t it be cool if your daughter, the smart one, figured out a new way to manage the power grid, saving thousands of megawatts of energy, while playing SimPower, Deluxe Edition, on her PC?
