August 13, 2013

ash dieback fight-back: new Facebook game

Members of the public will soon be able to help identify the clues needed to restore our ash woodlands to long-term health, vital work in the face of the ash dieback outbreak that is threatening to eliminate significant proportions of the UK’s ash tree population. The creation of a new Facebook game by researchers at the John Innes Centre, “Fraxinus”, will allow players to analyse data and reveal how the ash dieback fungus operates and what makes some trees naturally less susceptible.

Using real genetic data from ash trees and the Chalara fraxinea fungus, the game involves comparing and creating coloured patterns, capitalising on the pattern recognition power of the human eye. The entire Chalara and ash tree genomes are 60 million and 954 million nucleotides long, and the human eye is able to detect differences in these sequences when computers would generate errors if used alone. The game challenges players to match sequences of nucleotides represented by coloured leaf shapes, and could help provide the crucial information needed to help our ash tree population fight back from the current disease epidemic. 

Scientists and developers behind the game came to the SMC to explain its importance to the future survival of our ash woodlands.

Speakers:

Dr Dan MacLean, Head of Bioinformatics at The Sainsbury Laboratory

Russell Stearman, game designer from Team Cooper

Dr Anne Edwards, John Innes Centre scientist who first discovered ash dieback

Dr Joan Webber, Principal Pathologist & Head of Tree Health Research Group, Forest Research