Scientists are working to find a treatment or vaccine for Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, and they want the public's help.

Researchers have discovered the portion of Covid-19 that allows it to infect humans, and now you can help separate teams of scientists find a way to neuter the virus's power either by donating computing power or by playing a competitive online video game.

Folding@home is a Stanford-founded distributed computer network that pulls power from machines all over the planet to simulate protein folding—the creation of a protein’s unique shape—and drug design. Similarly to SETI@home, the Berkley based project that uses home computers to search for alien life, Folding@home runs in the background and uses your computer when you aren’t to help Stanford run protein folding simulations. You can download the program here. Now, Folding@home has turned its computer network to the task of fighting the coronavirus.

“We are uniquely positioned to help model the structure of the 2019-nCoV spike protein and identify sites that can be targeted by a therapeutic antibody," Folding@home said in a post explaining the project. We can build computational models that accomplish this goal, but it takes a lot of computing power.” If you want to take a more active role in the hunt for a protein to combat coronavirus, the Center for Game Science at the University of Washington has a game for you.

Foldit is a game where players compete and collaborate to build the proteins and amino acids. It’s like an active version of Folding@home where players actually physically manipulate digital simulations of molecules. Foldit has launched a coronavirus puzzle with the aim of finding a protein to neutralize its spike.

“This protein, called the coronavirus spike protein, allows the coronavirus to infect human cells,” Foldit scientist Brian Koepnick said in a YouTube video announcing the puzzle. “We wanna give Foldit players the opportunity to design proteins that bind to this spike protein and prevent infection.”

The puzzle is a fun way to allay your fears of the virus while actively working on a solution. But, with both projects, it’s important to remember that a simulated cure is just the beginning of the process of developing a vaccine. “We do want to emphasize that, like all the research we do, laboratory testing takes time to make sure these molecules are safe and effective against coronavirus,” Koepnick said.