This video game holds the clue for a potential cure for cancer

Gaurav Chopra has created a video game that is designed to stumble upon drug combinations to cure cancerOf all the research undertaken to find the cure for Alzheimers disease and cancer this one certainly appears one of a kind Gaurav Chopra an assistant professor in Chemistry from Purdue University Indiana has created a video game that is designed to stumble upon potential drug combinations for the cure of these deadly diseases The idea Chopra says is to engage the public in scientific discovery Its a virtual reality game that allows the player to potentially discover a new treatment for the diseases by manipulating drug compounds loaded into the gameExplaining how the game works Chopra says With an HTC Vive headset strapped on and controllers in both hands the game takes the user inside a biological cell The goal is to find the right combination of molecules to combat diseases There are target proteins loaded into the game that have been identified as playing some role that may lead to an important advance in treatment As the player rearranges the drug compound and docks it into the target protein the game displays a score that represents how well the compound is binding to the targetWhile in theory the process sounds like something thats hard to sink ones teeth into the professor assures that the real game play is quite the opposite He also stresses that one does not require a degree in chemistry to be able to play the game You dont need that to have fun manipulating molecular models or diving into a colourful protein Players can create new molecules which is where the true uniqueness of the game comes inThe game is currently being developed at Chopras lab in Purdue UniversityWhy virtual reality we ask We focused on virtual reality mainly because VR gives you an intuitive sense of manipulation and in the field of drug design being able to visualise data is really important Also there is already a lot of 2D visualisation software that show how drugs interact with proteins But there is only so much you can do on a computer screenWhile gaming and medical research may not be terms one would use in the same breath Chopra explains why crowdsourcing can work in this case If you have a small molecule with 100 atoms the possible ways of arranging these atoms are on the order of 1047 think 1 with 47 zeros behind it That is astronomical in terms of computing power which is why we need supercomputers But with crowdsourcing this problem can be tackled by multiple people at the same time And if you make it into a game people will figure out how to get a better score in the game even if they dont have a deep understanding of the chemistry behind itThe game is still being developed further to amp up its entertainment quotientThe plan is to design it as a multiplayer game that lets users compete against each other as well as against the computer We eventually hope to make this technology available to all through a mobile application says ChopraWhile medical research remains the mainstay behind the concept for Chopra the game is also about making Chemistry as a subject exciting for students I really want my sixyearold daughter to play this and be excited to know more about molecules Our dream is that people around the world should contribute protein targets and disease targets to the game and we can find drugs for all those targets togetherJust play on and solve those targetsBut as something that has been developed in a Chemistry lab this is more than just a game If you beat the computer we are going to go in and test what the player did in the lab If that test pans out the player will be a coauthor on the paper we write about it We want to involve the community in this research Chopra says