Icon representing a puzzle

Beginner Puzzle: Coronavirus

Closed since 4 months ago

Beginner

Summary

Created
October 16, 2025
Expires
Max points
100
Description

Design a protein binder against coronavirus! The starting structure shows how the coronavirus spike protein binds to a human receptor protein. The coronavirus protein (in gray) is mostly frozen, except for the orange and blue sidechains at the binding site. The binding site of coronavirus sticks to the human protein (in color), and this allows the coronavirus to infect human cells. We want to design a new protein that can bind to coronavirus more tightly than the human protein! A tight binder could block the normal coronavirus-human interaction, and might be used as an antiviral drug against coronavirus! Refold and mutate the starting structure to increase your score and improve binding against coronavirus! This is a Beginner puzzle for new players that have joined Foldit in the last 6 months.

Top groups

  1. Avatar for UPJ Biochem 25 11. UPJ Biochem 25 1 pt. 11,858
  2. Avatar for CBE_ProEn_2025 12. CBE_ProEn_2025 1 pt. 11,818
  3. Avatar for Otterbein Bioinformatics 2025 13. Otterbein Bioinformatics 2025 1 pt. 11,753
  4. Avatar for three men 14. three men 1 pt. 11,753
  5. Avatar for Brain Nourishment 15. Brain Nourishment 1 pt. 11,753
  1. Avatar for Chengkun Fei 271. Chengkun Fei Lv 1 2 pts. 11,753
  2. Avatar for Julianac28 272. Julianac28 Lv 1 2 pts. 11,753
  3. Avatar for Mohamad R 273. Mohamad R Lv 1 2 pts. 11,753
  4. Avatar for xinyih 274. xinyih Lv 1 2 pts. 11,753
  5. Avatar for wiseturtle 275. wiseturtle Lv 1 2 pts. 11,753
  6. Avatar for cacuellar711 276. cacuellar711 Lv 1 2 pts. 11,753
  7. Avatar for sophiasoldatos 277. sophiasoldatos Lv 1 2 pts. 11,753
  8. Avatar for YamilaC 278. YamilaC Lv 1 2 pts. 11,753
  9. Avatar for jbs83p0x7@mozmail.com 279. jbs83p0x7@mozmail.com Lv 1 2 pts. 11,753
  10. Avatar for Luka$es 280. Luka$es Lv 1 2 pts. 11,753

Comments