RPG Management Science

Role-playing games (RPG) are “resource-limited problem solving games”, where the players assume the role of other characters and solve (usually fantastic) problems. While RPG are often associated with Dungeons & Dragons and the likes, beside the combat intensive part of it, they really involve social, ethical and moral dilemmas that shape the characters’ personality as well as their social surrounding. Just like real life.

And like real businesses. Often managers deal with social, ethical and moral dilemmas without any prior training or practicing. These are usually trying times and can greatly influence the business as well as the manager herself. Why not use RPG as a source of (fun) training for managers?

I do not mean a “simulated” situation, but actually creating a (preferably hidden) one-to-one connection between a real-life business scenario and a fantastic one, involving wizards (=engineers), clerics (=other religions), elves and dwarves (=minorities) and dragons (=VCs). This mapping can be specific for a unique business or more general for managerial conflicts and problems that are common to many businesses. Managers can then play this game and either be tested on their abilities or trained over and over in different scenarios, guided by the Dungeon Master (=coach, CEO).

While not all managers (probably a small minority, to be truthful) are inclined to fantasy games, similar situations can be accustomed to other fictional scenarios, e.g. Science-fiction, historic, other-geography, such that the people playing the game will feel comfortable.

Another unique aspect to this suggestion is to have the business group, e.g. team, department, play together and either assume their correct roles, i.e. manager=leader, engineer=wizard, etc. or even better, switch roles and thus better understand the dilemmas and problems each other have in their own unique role. The psychological disconnection between the real life and the RPG can help people loosen-up and have a common experience that is related to their work, but only in a hidden way. In future business situations, a team member can then say: “I’m off to battle the Red Dragon”, and the rest of the team will wish her good luck with the VC, creating a unique and a more playful atmosphere in the business world.

Go on, businessmen, have some fun!

Transformative cubism

To continue the idea behind 3D cubism, one can also insert new geometrical transformations into the mix. If you draw a picture where the x/y coordinates are transformed to polar coordinates, a weird shape will appear. Why not do it in three dimensions? Take a 3D object and convert each point from x/y/z to spherical coordinates. For example, the x-axis can be radius, y-axis longitude and z-axis latitude. Then 3D print it and let people guess what it is.

Combining 3D cubism with Transformative cubism is the ultimate! Convert time into angle and see what happens. This is a whole new kid of art, but a mathematical one. Can it grant us a deeper understanding of physical space-time? Black holes? Non-Euclidean spaces?

Having these types of objects in real life, i.e. 3d printed objects that represent a transformative 4d videos, can raise also neuroscience-type questions. Can we learn how to “unfold” these structures in our mind, i.e. look at a transformed object and “know” what it is? Can we learn how to “fold” them in our mind, i.e. given a known object and a weird transformation, can we imagine how this object look like? It is easily testable by printing the object out.

Can’t believe Cubism rocks! 

Specific, targeted Ig-coated cancer treatment

The problem with cancer cells are that they are embedded in healthy tissue. The goal is to target only the cancerous cells and leave the healthy tissue intact. The key is that the cancerous cells are different from the healthy surrounding, but we don’t know how they are different.

The project I suggest is to develop a specialized system that identifies the distinguishing factors of a specific cancer from its surrounding. This falls under the new emerging field of personalized medicine. It involves the combination of the following things: biopsy, generation of Ig (immunoglobulins) with GFP (Green Fluorescent Protein), Ig-coated drug delivery system.

Let’s start with the easiest part. The system requires a biopsy from the target cancer to be eliminated. However, the system also requires biopsy from the surrounding healthy tissue. If you also get to have other biopsies of other healthy tissues of the person, even better.

The next stage is tricky, but already doable today. Ig are small molecules from our immune system. They can attach to different targets on cells, called antigens. There are practically an infinite variety of Ig, since they are composed from a combination of 15-22 amino-acids. This is how the immune system “learns” to detect foreign and harmful things.

I propose to have a “bank” of Ig-GFP, where the latter is a protein that emits green fluorescent light. The goal is to immerse the cancerous cell with each of these tagged Ig-GFP and get a “reading” of how much binding there has been. By running a bank of these Ig-GFP, one can get an “Ig-fingerprint” of that specific cell.

However, this is not enough. The point is to also immerse the surrounding healthy tissue sample with the same bank, with the goal of finding the best distinguishing combination of Ig that maximizes the binding to the cancerous cells and minimizes the binding to the healthy tissue. If you really want to go crazy, you can make it an adaptive optimization process by which one generates an adaptation mechanism on the Ig binding site to maximize specificity.

Once we found the best combination that binds specifically only to the cancerous cell, one needs to use this information to kill it in the body. There are already several mechanisms of targeted drug delivery. One of them is through micelles, which are large round membranes that contain the drug. If one can thus coat these delivery systems with the Ig-combination we found, these will only attach to the cancerous cells, and not to the surrounding healthy tissue. Combining binding with drug-release completes the job.

This may sound like a very hard thing to do, but the benefits are enormous. Targeted, minimal side-effects cancer therapy that can work on almost any type of cancer

Sims for Parents

There are many simulators of life, e.g. SimCity and Sims are the ones that most come to mind. Their point is to simulate real life with all its intricacies as much as possible, making decision making, planning, gathering information and similar cognitive tasks the goal of the game, thus teaching players how to “do it right”.

Why not Sim for Parents? In this I mean a simulator for taking care of babies, infants and children. While obviously there is no one “right” way to do it, most parents come totally unprepared for the task. There are obviously “courses” to teach young parents, but in this technological age, why not use the same technology young parents use in their daily lives to teach them about what’s coming?

I propose to develop a game that “runs” a child’s life at its core, from the very first childbirth, through diapers, crying, sleep (or lack thereof), feeding, etc. While obviously, some of the problems are physical, e.g. lack of sleep and breastfeeding, one can come to terms with it via the avatar. For example, integrating this into a Sim environment, the avatar can experience sleep deprivation akin to parents’ and therefore cope with stress in a totally different way. One must also make many joint decisions with the spouse, even more so with children than any other endeavor in their lives. While negotiating and discussing it prior to the child's arrival is often the case, the “real deal” is often a whole different ball game.

I suggest that the game be played by both parents, simultaneously, to practice joint decision making and taking care of the child. This can give parents an invaluable gift that life does not give: several attempts at the same thing, i.e. the parents-to-be can try different approaches in the simulator and see what happens, if they like it, accept it, change it.

Obviously, the AI of the game is problematic, since there are many different theories, practices and approaches to how children develop. To complicate things more, the only agreement among practitioners is that each child is different. However, this can still be simulated in the game. For example, the parents, in order to win, must “raise” several children, each one with a different attitude. The parents thus need to practice both recognizing their Sim-child temperament, as well as how to deal with it.

One can insert a lot of scientific knowledge about child development at different ages, together with common problems that parents have to deal with, e.g. gasses, fever, etc.

The game should also be connected to experts in the field, i.e. players who really want to learn more should be able to connect to practitioners either in their local environment or via web to international experts. Furthermore, as in any game in our age, this can be a social game, in the sense that players can chat and collaborate in tips and attitudes, very similar to the real life.

To conclude, I believe there is enough knowledge and technology to create a realistic simulation of child development and parents’ influence on it. Many theories can be incorporated into the game, as well as many children’s temperaments. This can be an invaluable asset to parents-to-be in encountering problems before they happen in a realistic way.

Molecular copy machine

Today there are ways to measure the 3D surface of molecular and atomic structures, e.g. atomic force microscopy (AFM) that scans a surface and based on the force exerted on its tip, it can reconstruct the structure of the surface. The same AFM can also induce force, or through running current through it, bleach or modify a surface of specific materials.

I suggest connecting two such AFMs, where one is the reader and one is the writer for a molecular copy machine. One scans a surface and immediately transfer the 3D information to another one, which bleaches or changes the surface underneath it with the same pattern.

An ever more amazing goal, although I’m not sure it is feasible today, is to copy the actual 3D structure, i.e. not modifying the surface, but adding to it the appropriate number of atoms so as to achieve the same 3D surface. Probably a better way to go about it is to etch the negative of the scanned surface onto a new one.

Can this be made digitally, in the sense of high fidelity copying? If so, that can be a revolutionary way of storing data, art and communication, in the 3D surface of atomic structure.

Augmented Vision Part II – Feeling air

Today there are intricate models of air-flow, even in urban areas. Furthermore, based on the current weather measurements, there are extremely detailed pressure, humidity and temperature information of almost every place on earth. Wouldn’t it be great to actually see and experience them un-filtered?

I suggest to have an augmented reality device, e.g. Google Glass, that can present the current atmospheric situation at the place you are now. Seeing the actual air-flows, humidity and pressure variations, temperature gradients. This information can instantly connect a person to the surrounding environment.

It can also help scientists and researcher understand their models of air-flow. By combining the augmented reality not to models, but rather to in-place sensors, one can “go around and measure the flow of air with one’s own eyes”. That can be a unique experience and I propose one that can introduce new appreciation and sensation of the environment and its intricacies.

Another option to augment vision is with another sense, for example tactile information. There was a recent work where computational vision increased the sensitivity of movements, ones so minute that could not be seen by the naked eye. One can do this with air-flows, in the same context of walking and seeing air-flows, one can combine a wearable bat (see my previous post), such that detection of minute air-flows and winds are increased and are felt via wearable vibrators on the cloth. This can create a fully immersive experience: seeing air and feeling its flow.

3D letter based toys

Inspired by WordWorld where words come alive, the basic concept is that words create the thing that they represent. Thus a dog is created and shaped by the letters D-O-G. Every object in that world is made up, literally, from the letters that name it.

I propose designing such toys that are made up of the letters that make them. Thus, for example, a car will be made up of the letters C-A-R. The challenge here is two-fold: (i) designing toys from the letters, which is relatively easy and (ii) designing the letters to fit several toys. Thus, for example, C should be part of both C-A-T and C-A-R, yet still have a single shape for both.

Hence, I propose an automatic designing algorithm that receives a list of 3D-models of toys, or at-least their 3D-silhouettes, and the letters that make them up. The output of the algorithm is a 3D design of the letters and their attachment, such that one can create the toys simply be attaching the letters together.

The real challenge will be when presented with many toys, such that each letter appears at least twice or thrice. Then a single design of the letter should be the output of the algorithm, such that all the toys can be made. This is a truly constrained problem that should prove to be a challenge to 3D-designers. The reward would be cool educational toys that can be 3D printed by everybody. Good luck.