Growing infrastructures for "citizen science" will help shape 21st century science

Hyungsub Choi — Sat, 26 Jan 2008 11:32:34 -0800

Description

We have thought a bit about the trend leading from the 20th century "science cities" to the 21st century "city science." This is the turn from the "Big" science and technology toward more distributed research activities. What would be the necessary infrastructure for this transition?

Jeff Johannes, medicinal chemist at a large pharmaceutical company, wrote an interesting posting on the blog Sceptical Chymist (http://blogs.nature.com/thescepticalchymist/features/10_miles_from_academia/):

Independence is a really good thing. Some amazing discoveries have come from qualified people or groups that were allowed to truly explore their own ideas, free of external bias or constraints. One clear example of the power of this concept exists in the context of popular music. During the 20th century there was an explosion of diverse musical genres that continues today. Many factors contributed to this process, but one of the most important was the fact that musical instruments and recording equipment gradually became cheaper while at the same time becoming more widely available. This made music accessible to anyone who had a desire to pick up an instrument and create music. Moreover, they could use their own recording equipment to communicate their ideas to interested parties. Today, with the advent of computers and digital recording, musicians can make home recordings of a rather high quality and easily share their songs on the internet. It is truly an exciting time to be a musician.

In terms of accessibility and expense, chemistry, and most modern sciences in general, are way behind music. A budding rock star can buy a $200 guitar at a local retailer and record songs at home, but when I think of chemistry, I think of $600,000 NMRs and $100,000 LCMS stacks installed in the hallowed halls of the worlds great schools. I consider myself extremely lucky to have access to such amazing equipment. But many scientists don’t.

While modern science is more technologically complex than music, I see no fundamental limitation to increasing the accessibility and reducing the cost of doing research. I think this is one of the great challenges facing science. Inexpensive scientific instruments would empower new scientists, give more independence to existing researchers, and lead to an increase in creativity in scientific research.

The indicator to watch to see whether scientific research is indeed following the trajectory of popular music is the availability of the scientific analogue of the "$200 guitar at a local retailer." Are there efforts to lower the cost of spectrometers, DNA analyzers, and NMR machines? Why don't scientific instruments follow the path of PCs, in a way that exponentially improves size and performance?

This has implications for the Brazilian case as well, about which Alex Pang has posted a few signals. In order to have a more diffuse model of scientific activity, one would need more readily available instruments. Perhaps science version of "One Laptop Per Child"?

Signals

The Amateur New York Subway Riding Committee - Collaborative Adventure Science

Citizens as sensors: the world of volunteered geography

Amateur cancer researcher (and patient) partners with academia and VC to prototype a cure

Leapfrogging: New Approach to Economic Development

Alex Soojung-Kim Pang — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 11:10:30 -0700

Description

Distributed and wireless technologies may precipitate innovative strategies for economic growth in poor countries enabling the rapid development of economic infrastructure.

Conventional approaches to economic development in poor countries have focused on slow but steady transformation through the development of open markets and civil society. Growing nations have been expected to follow a path to industrialisation similar to that of Western nations -- first exploiting natural resources through trade and then moving up the value chain into production and services. A key component of this route to transformation is heavy public investment in large infrastructure networks for transportation, water, and power. However, developing countries in the 21st century rarely have the resources for such large infrastructure investments, and they face unprecedented population pressures quite unlike the Western experience of a century or more ago.

What the 21st century does offer is miniaturisation, wireless communications, and embedded computation. These technologies could permit the rapid deployment of distributed infrastructures in developing countries. Thus, they could radically change the approach to development aid and the way the West understands how to lift nations out of poverty.

Perhaps the best example of new development strategies is the way Grameen Telecom in Bangladesh has coupled new techniques for micro-credit lending with a modular, rapidly deployable cellular wireless network to widely distribute shared mobile phones managed by small-scale entrepreneurs. Strategies such as these will help a growing number of nations enjoy significant gains in economic productivity associated with a freer flow of information. (One recent study of Africa(Vodafone, 2005) claims that "a 1 per cent increase in mobile penetration rates is associated with 0.5-0.6 per cent higher rates of FDI/GDP.")

As distributed "leapfrog" technologies for computing, communications, power generation, water purification, and health care provision enter the market, they may spur development economists to rethink the traditional development model and create new frameworks for growth.

Implications:
* Increased support for development of domestic technology industries
* Increased life expectancy for people in developing countries

Early Indicators:
* Rapid growth of cell phone networks and subscriber bases
* Deregulation and spectrum reallocation to accommodate current and future uses of wireless technology
* Announcement in January 2005 of a new research initiative by the MIT Media Lab to develop a $100 laptop, a technology that could revolutionise how the world's children are educated
* University of Nairobi in Kenya is launching a program on mobile phone software development in its computer science program, indicating a shift away from mainfame/PC in African computer science training (Nathan Eagle of MIT Media Lab will help them create the curriculum)
* GSM Association's Emerging Markets Handset Program [link]
* Ethiopia's nationwide VSAT project, estimated funding at 10% of GDP [link]

What to Watch:
* India's wireless subscribers grow to more than 150 million over the next 5 years.
* Radical changes in the allocation of aid to developing countries result in less focus on large infrastructure projects and more on distributed infrastucture and micro-enterprise.
* Technological societies develop in Africa, but without extensive industrialisation.
* A verbal/pictorial Web is developed for illiterate peoples to use.

Parallels/Precedents:

Enablers/drivers:
* Development of improved batteries and alternate portable power-generation techniques (such as Freeplay radio)
* Use of mobile phones, rather than wire, in developing countries
* Development of interactive voice response systems and Internet gateways