Stall Catchers Catch-a-Thon

Background: A “Catchathon” is a catching marathon of the Stall Catchers citizen science game. Anyone can hold one in their local pub, school, library, hackerspace or anywhere else! The Stall Catchers project was designed by researchers at Cornell University to advance Alzheimer’s solutions. You can help by playing a simple game: view short videos from the brains of mice and “catch” stalls. We will teach you how to score blood vessels as “flowing” or “stalled." Even the most powerful computer technologies can’t do this accurately enough yet, but your keen eyes can help us process decades worth of data.

This is an especially great project for competitions because you can create teams to compete against each other and request a custom leaderboard for your event.

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Preparation:

1. Review the project protocol on SciStarter: https://scistarter.org/Affiliates/stall-catchers-Affiliates.
2. Visit StallCatchers.com to create an account and create a team for your event.
3. Contact info@stallcatchers.com to inquire about a personalized leaderboard.

Talking Points

• Today, there is no treatment for Alzheimer’s. Together with researchers at Cornell University, we have a goal to change that.
• We’re focusing on one aspect of the disease: reduced blood flow in the brain. It’s a symptom of Alzheimer’s that has been known about for years, but until now, nobody knew why reduced blood flow happens in the brain.”
• Researchers recently discovered that stalls (clogged blood vessels in the brain) are responsible for this blood flow reduction in mice with Alzheimer’s. By reducing the number of stalls, the lab was able to restore memory and reduce other cognitive symptoms in mice.
• To fully understand how stalls are contributing to Alzheimer’s and discover potential treatment targets, we need to get through lots of data. We need your keen eyes for that - even the most powerful computer technologies can’t do that accurately enough yet. Without the public’s help, this process could take decades.
• In Stall Catchers, we “catch” stalls by looking at video clips from the brain of mice, scoring blood vessels as “flowing” or “stalled."

Program Description

Set the Stage

• Introduce the concept of citizen science using Foundations of Citizen Science facilitator slides and guide.
• Have participants create accounts on SciStarter.org.
• Define Alzheimer’s disease and share about the Stall Catchers project using the talking points below.
• Use informational videos from https://stallcatchers.com/about#stall-catchers to help you communicate this.

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Collect Data

• Guide participants in creating an account on Stall Catchers with the same email as their SciStarter account.
• Tip: If this is a youth program, create a few accounts connected to library emails in advance for participants to use so they do not need to create their own accounts with personal emails.
• After signing in to StallCatchers.com, participants will start with the short tour and tutorial of the game
• Share the Leaderboard on a larger screen if you created one in advance (see preparation).

Take Action

Program Description

• Reviews results (how many classifications done by each participant), with a call to action for volunteers to continue to participate.
• Leaderboards are super helpful for goal setting because it will illustrate the hard work you’ve accomplished as a team.
• Send attendees off with a take home flyer to encourage continued participation.

Leaderboard View