ScienceAtHome is a team of scientists, game developers, designers and visual artists based at

Aarhus University Aarhus University ( da, Aarhus Universitet, abbreviated AU) is a public research university with its main campus located in Aarhus, Denmark. It is the second largest and second oldest university in Denmark. The university is part of the Coimbra G ...

, Denmark. ScienceAtHome does research on

quantum physics Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory in physics that provides a description of the physical properties of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. It is the foundation of all quantum physics including quantum chemistry, q ...

citizen science Citizen science (CS) (similar to community science, crowd science, crowd-sourced science, civic science, participatory monitoring, or volunteer monitoring) is scientific research conducted with participation from the public (who are sometimes re ...

and

gamification Gamification is the strategic attempt to enhance systems, services, organizations, and activities by creating similar experiences to those experienced when playing games in order to motivate and engage users. This is generally accomplished thro ...

. ScienceAtHome also develops games that contribute to scientific research, and studies how humans interpret information to achieve results superior to some algorithmic approaches. Most ScienceAtHome games are

casual games A casual game is a video game targeted at a mass market audience, as opposed to a hardcore game, which is targeted at hobbyist gamers. Casual games may exhibit any type of gameplay and genre. They generally involve simpler rules, shorter sessio ...

and require no formal scientific training. Over 150,000. people have contributed to ScienceAtHome citizen science projects by playing games. Research games are also part of a much larger movement of creating

serious games A serious game or applied game is a game designed for a primary purpose other than pure entertainment. The "serious" adjective is generally prepended to refer to video games used by industries like defense, education, scientific exploration, he ...

that go beyond mere entertainment. The premise behind such games is that humans are better than computers at performing certain tasks, because of their intuition and superior visual processing. Video games are now being used to channel these abilities to solve problems in quantum physics.

History

The idea of computer players solving quantum problems came to Jacob Sherson's mind while he was doing research at

Johannes Gutenberg University The Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (german: Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz) is a public research university in Mainz, Rhineland Palatinate, Germany, named after the printer Johannes Gutenberg since 1946. With approximately 32,000 stud ...

, Mainz, in the group of Prof.

Immanuel Bloch Immanuel Bloch (born 16 November 1972, Fulda) is a German experimental physicist. His research is focused on the investigation of quantum many-body systems using ultracold atomic and molecular quantum gases. Bloch is known for his work on atoms ...

. The first form of ScienceAtHome was announced in 2012 based on the idea that computer game players could solve quantum problems. It was then called CODER – "Pilot Center for Community-driven Research: Game Assisted Quantum Computing". CODER later grew and evolved into ScienceAtHome with the first game born in 2012 called Quantum Moves. ScienceAtHome is now part of the Center for Hybrid Intelligence situated at the Department of Management at Aarhus BSS.

Publications

Jacob Sherson gave a speech at TEDxAarhus 2016 called "How to become a quantum physicist in five minutes". Pinja Haikka, Postdoctoral Researcher in Theoretical Physics, also introduced ScienceAtHome at Women in Science event at Aarhus University, which was published on local television ITV OJ. ScienceAtHome has been featured in a number of journals such as PNAS and Physical Review Research, and magazines like the Diplomatic Courier and Hosting Advice. ScienceAtHome has also been featured in the Danish Broadcasting Corporation (DR). In 2020, Jacob Sherson, ScienceAtHome, won Breakthrough of the Year at the World Science Summit for Breaking the Wall of Hybrid Intelligence.

Projects

Games

References

{{reflist 2012 establishments in Denmark Citizen science Online games