3. Improving Your Neighbourhood
Developed by a growing team of passionate entrepreneurs, SeeClickFix is a communications platform designed to allow citizens to report non-emergency issues for governments and local authorities to track and manage. Commonly reported issues include sightings of potholes, graffiti, and inoperative traffic lights. Other residents can even put in their two cents on reported issues to highlight problems that are particularly urgent. The ultimate goal is to provide the best tools for residents and governments to communicate effectively in their communities. According to the developers, 75 percent of the issues reported get resolved and, although the success of the app has varied depending on location, many users have reported that it really does work, as small changes in their community have added up over time and made a big difference for the people living there.
2. Helping the Blind
By using the wonderfully inventive Be My Eyes app, anyone who possesses normal eyesight can volunteer to help the visually impaired. Once registered with the service as a volunteer, you’re officially ‘on call’ and can be contacted anytime and connected through a live video feed to a person in need of assistance. No need worry about having to drop everything or quit your day job to help the blind though — if you don’t respond, the app will automatically just move on to the next available volunteer.
1. Folding Proteins
Proteins are biological macromolecules that perform a multitude of functions in the human body including catalyzing metabolic reactions and forming the building blocks for tissues like skin and blood. Depending on their function, they can fold themselves into literally billions of different shapes, but, when the folding process goes awry, that’s when debilitating diseases such as Alzheimer’s can arise. The problem is that scientists don’t quite understand exactly what causes protein folding errors in the first place — which is where you and your handy smartphone come in. By downloading and running the Folding@Home app from Sony, researchers at Stanford University can take advantage of your smartphone’s processing power to help them carry out the millions of complicated calculations required for protein behavior investigation and analysis. The app uses Wi-Fi and, while it never tracks any personal data, performing all those in-depth calculations can be quite taxing on a phone’s battery — so make sure you plug your phone in or have a charger handy when you use it.
Wes Walcott
Wes is a devourer of media. He ravenously consumes podcasts, books, and TV shows with seemingly no regard for review scores or subject matter. If encountered in the wild, Wes is said to respond positively to verbal cues relating to X-Men or the SNES. The subject can be easily captured and tamed using Transformers or Gundam models.
