Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) feels the need to contribute to social causes for the welfare and benefit of the people. This is the reason it has formed a unique and unusual partnership with a scientific organization, Autism Speaks and a philanthropist Dr. Stephens to find a cure or prevention to this problem.
An ambitious plan has been devised in which the data of more than 10,000 people effected by autism and the data of their families will be uploaded to a cloud database that will be sortable and made available for all people at all times. The plan has been named as AUT10K- Autism Speaks Ten Thousands Genome Program. It aims to exploit the power of big data and data sharing through the use of technologically advanced world so that researchers from all across the globe can contribute to the solution of this mysterious problem.
Autism is a very familiar neurodevelopmental disorder that hinders a person’s social interaction, verbal and non-verbal communication. Despite staying so familiar over the past couple of years, the cure to the disease has not been found since the cause remains a mystery. There has also been a gradual rise in the number of people being diagnosed with Autism. It now affects every 1 in 68 newborns in the United States of America as compared to every 1 in 166 newborns ten years ago.
Due to the speculation and uncertainty surrounding the disease that leaves parents frustrated and depressed, Google has now started this partnership to find a cure to this problem. The project that Google is carrying out is worth $50 million and if successful will not only help doctors and other professionals in understanding and treating this disease but will go a long way to change the way the problem is tackled in the next century.
This project initiated by Google Inc. will open up a whole world of Autism research. According to Autism Speaks co-founder, this project will cover the research that they were planning to carry out in the next 20 years due to the availability of funds that have been provided by Google. This life science project will be benefited by the use of Google cloud platform which has been originally designed to store, analyze and classify huge quantities of data for research and other purposes. This cloud platform will also allow the easy access to the required data unlike in the past where the data was stored on physical hard drives and too much time was spent on finding the required data. However, there have been many critics of the partnership between Autism Speaks and Google.
Many people have raised ethical concerns about the right of putting personal information of Autism patients on Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) platform for visibility across the globe. AKU10K offers no protection against the donor genetic information being used for commercial purposes, but most of all Autism Speaks has no one who suffers from this disease on its board and critics believe the solution cannot be found without the input of those affected. All in all it is a good initiative taken up by Google for social welfare.
