OpenVaccine – Successful the combat towards the COVID-19 pandemic would require an efficient vaccine that may be equitably and extensively distributed. Constructing upon many years of analysis has allowed scientists to speed up the seek for a vaccine towards COVID-19, however on daily basis that goes by with no vaccine has monumental prices for the world nonetheless. We’d like new, recent concepts from all corners of the world. Might on-line gaming and crowdsourcing assist remedy a worldwide pandemic? Pairing scientific and crowdsourced intelligence might assist computational biochemists make measurable progress.
mRNA vaccines have taken the lead because the quickest vaccine candidates for COVID-19, however presently, they face key potential limitations. One of many greatest challenges proper now’s the right way to design tremendous steady messenger RNA molecules (mRNA). Typical vaccines (like your seasonal flu pictures) are packaged in disposable syringes and shipped underneath refrigeration world wide, however that isn’t presently attainable for mRNA vaccines.
Researchers have noticed that RNA molecules have the tendency to spontaneously degrade. This can be a critical limitation–a single lower can render the mRNA vaccine ineffective. Presently, little is understood on the main points of the place within the spine of a given RNA is most susceptible to being affected. With out this data, present mRNA vaccines towards COVID-19 should be ready and shipped underneath intense refrigeration, and are unlikely to achieve greater than a tiny fraction of human beings on the planet until they are often stabilized.
The Eterna neighborhood, led by Professor Rhiju Das, a computational biochemist at Stanford’s College of Medication, brings collectively scientists and avid gamers to resolve puzzles and invent medication. Eterna is a web-based online game platform that challenges gamers to resolve scientific issues resembling mRNA design via puzzles. The options are synthesized and experimentally examined at Stanford by researchers to realize new insights about RNA molecules. The Eterna neighborhood has beforehand unlocked new scientific rules, made new diagnostics towards lethal ailments, and engaged the world’s most potent mental assets for the betterment of the general public. The Eterna neighborhood has superior biotechnology via its contribution in over 20 publications, together with advances in RNA biotechnology.
On this competition, we want to leverage the information science experience of the Kaggle neighborhood to develop fashions and design guidelines for RNA degradation. Your mannequin will predict probably degradation charges at every base of an RNA molecule, educated on a subset of an Eterna dataset comprising over 3000 RNA molecules (which span a panoply of sequences and constructions) and their degradation charges at every place. We’ll then rating your fashions on a second era of RNA sequences which have simply been devised by Eterna gamers for COVID-19 mRNA vaccines. These remaining take a look at sequences are presently being synthesized and experimentally characterised at Stanford College in parallel to your modeling efforts — Nature will rating your fashions!
Bettering the soundness of mRNA vaccines was an issue that was being explored earlier than the pandemic however was anticipated to take a few years to resolve. Now, we should remedy this deep scientific problem in months, if not weeks, to speed up mRNA vaccine analysis and ship a refrigerator-stable vaccine towards SARS-CoV-2, the virus behind COVID-19. The issue we are attempting to resolve has eluded tutorial labs, business R&D teams, and supercomputers, and so we’re turning to you. To assist, you may be part of the crew of online game gamers, scientists, and builders at Eterna to unlock the important thing in our combat towards this devastating pandemic.
Awards:-
- 1st Place – $ 12,000
- 2nd Place – $ 8,000
- third Place – $ 5,000
Deadline:- 02-10-2020
