As a UK citizen, sometimes we get left out of the gaming hype. We don’t have any of the big publishing houses and not many games are set in Merry Old England. We do, however, given the opportunity, come up with some amazing, life changing ideas.
Cancer Research UK one of the largest charities in the United Kingdom have released more information regarding their upcoming game, which will allow you to analyze real gene data from the charity in order to help identify new causes of cancer. The game, GeneGame is set to be released in the autumn.
This follows on from Cell Slider, which was launched last year, which asked people to help classify breast cancer samples that had been archived. Cell Slider has contributed to 1.6m classifications of breast cancer samples.
The logic behind the games is simply that the scientists currently researching cancer do not have the man hours to get through the vast amount of data they need to, and by encouraging the public, who would be tapping away on mobile games anyway, to help – well it helps all of us.
GameGene is being developed by Scottish company Guerilla Tea. Cancer Research UK’s Citizen Science Lead told wired.co.uk they chose this developer as: “They consulted with [cancer researchers] to make sure the mechanics would lead to the most robust science possible.”
However, she is not hesitant to admit that if the crowdsourcing method is not meeting the scientific benchmarks it will be discontinued.
In 2008 there was an estimated 12.7 million new cases of cancer diagnosed worldwide. Everyone from your casual mobile gamer, to the most hardcore of PvPer’s can help in the fight against the biggest killer of the modern age.
