Accepted for/Published in: Journal of Medical Internet Research
Date Submitted: Sep 16, 2022
Date Accepted: Mar 12, 2023
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Almost Rocket Science: Using Crowdsourcing Challenge to Close Technology Gaps in Neurosurgery
ABSTRACT
Background:
With the current exponential increase in technical innovations worldwide, potential solutions for any new problem might already exist, despite having been developed to solve a different problem. We reached out to the crowd to raise awareness of our challenge of developing intraoperative, real-time identification of fiber tracts and tumor borders to improve neurosurgical oncology.
Objective:
Our objective was to evaluate the feasibility of crowdsourcing campaigns for raising awareness and finding out-of-the-box solutions for challenges in neuroscience.
Methods:
We ran a prize-based crowdsourcing competition on the commercial platform HeroX offering prize money previously collected through a crowdfunding campaign. In a multi-stage approach, we selected promising technical solutions based on broad, predefined criteria.
Results:
Our online campaign attracted more than 20,000 views, and we received 45 proposals from 32 individuals and 7 teams. These solvers, who were working in various fields, came from 26 countries on 4 continents. Further exchanges with 3 of the 5 finalists ensued, and a successful scientific collaboration was initiated with the winner of the challenge.
Conclusions:
Prize-based crowdsourcing campaigns are a promising strategy for raising awareness, finding innovative solutions, and establishing new scientific collaborations in neuroscience. Clinical Trial: N/A
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