What Human Computation Institute does

The Human Computation Institute (HCI) is a nonprofit innovation center headquartered in Ithaca, New York, founded in 2014 to engineer participatory systems that combine networked humans and machines to address complex societal challenges in health, humanitarian, and educational domains. Its core portfolio centers on citizen science platforms that crowdsource the analysis of biomedical and scientific data: Stall Catchers (with Cornell University's Schaffer-Nishimura Lab) crowdsources blood-vessel movie annotation for Alzheimer's research, Beta Catchers (with UC Davis's Dugger Lab) crowdsources pathology identification in brain tissue images, Dream Catchers crowdsources work for Sudden Infant Death Syndrome research, and Crowd2Map Tanzania crowdsources rural mapping. The institute also operates Polymath Plus, an AI-assisted collaborative platform for mathematical proof discovery funded by Renaissance Philanthropy, and is developing Civium as an integration layer for sustainable human computation systems.

HCI's underlying technology is human computation — structured systems in which distributed volunteers serve as computational elements, often guided by specialized interfaces and increasingly augmented by AI-assisted tooling. The institute publishes the Human Computation Journal, the Handbook of Human Computation (2nd edition), and the Handbook of Collective Intelligence, which position it as a thought-leadership node in the field. Its core team of five (Executive Director Pietro Michelucci, Operations and Grants Manager Margaret Lane, Citizen Science Coordinator Caroline Nickerson, Media Specialist Gretė Vaičaitytė, and Social Media Specialist Tito Oye) is supplemented by a Board of Directors and an external faculty spanning Cornell, McGill, UC Davis, the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre, and the Doug Engelbart Institute (via Christina Engelbart as advisor).

The institute's business model is donation- and grant-funded rather than commercial; all citizen science platforms are free to participants, there is no product pricing, and revenue derives from individual donations and foundation grants such as those from BrightFocus Foundation and Renaissance Philanthropy. Distribution is direct via project websites (stallcatchers.com, dreamcatchers.app, humancomputation.org) and through partner channels including SciStarter and university collaborators. Primary stakeholders are citizen science volunteers, academic and research institutions, and humanitarian organizations seeking scalable data analysis methods.

Name

Human Computation Institute

Legal name

Human Computation Institute

Website

https://humancomputation.org

Company type

Private

Founded year

2014

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

Human Computation Institute is a nonprofit that builds citizen science platforms — such as Stall Catchers, Beta Catchers, and Polymath Plus — to crowdsource biomedical and scientific analysis, serving volunteer participants alongside academic and research partners including Cornell and UC Davis.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Citizen Science Platforms

NAICS

Scientific Research and Development Services (5417), Educational Support Services (611710), Custom Computer Programming Services (541511)

SIC

Services-Computer Integrated Systems Design (7373), Services-Commercial Physical & Biological Research (8731), Services-Computer Programming Services (7371)

akta.pro primary industry

AI & Machine Learning (Foundations & Applied) (EDAMACAG)

akta.pro secondary industry

AI & Emerging Technology Literacy (EDAAAIAJ)

Keywords

• Citizen science platforms
• Human computation systems
• Crowdsourced research
• Participatory science
• Alzheimer's research games

Headquarters

HQ city

Ithaca

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Markets served

GTM type

B2B and B2C

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Operations, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. Donations and Grants: As a nonprofit organization, HCI relies on donations and grant funding to support its operations and research initiatives. The website includes a dedicated donation page.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels7 records

Core offering

The Human Computation Institute is a nonprofit innovation center that builds citizen science platforms combining networked humans and machines to address complex societal challenges. It develops and operates online games and research platforms (such as Stall Catchers, Beta Catchers, Dream Catchers, Polymath Plus, CrowdMeter, Civium, and Crowd2Map Tanzania) that crowdsource analysis of biomedical and humanitarian data. The institute also publishes academic resources including the Human Computation Journal and the Handbook of Human Computation.

Product overview

The Human Computation Institute operates as a nonprofit innovation center offering a portfolio of citizen science platforms and research initiatives rather than a unified commercial product. The core portfolio includes citizen science games (Stall Catchers, Beta Catchers, Dream Catchers) that crowdsource analysis of biomedical data for health research; collaborative research platforms (Polymath Plus for mathematical discovery, Civium for sustainable human computation integration); and social impact tools (CrowdMeter for public health, Crowd2Map Tanzania for development mapping). The institute also publishes academic resources including the Human Computation Journal, the Handbook of Human Computation (2nd Edition), and related scholarly handbooks. All offerings are focused on participatory systems that combine networked humans and machines to address societal challenges in health, humanitarian, and educational domains.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Stall Catchers: Citizen science game that crowdsources analysis of blood vessel movies to accelerate Alzheimer's research with Cornell's Schaffer-Nishimura Lab.
• Beta Catchers
• Polymath Plus
• CrowdMeter
• Civium
• Crowd2Map Tanzania
• Dream Catchers
• Human Computation Journal

Products and services

• Stall Catchers Citizen science game that crowdsources analysis of blood vessel movies to accelerate Alzheimer's research in collaboration with Cornell University's Schaffer-Nishimura Lab. Players analyze video data to identify stalled blood vessels, which may be an early warning sign of Alzheimer's disease.
• Beta Catchers Citizen science project for Alzheimer's research developed with UC Davis's Dugger Lab. Focuses on identifying Alzheimer's-related pathology in microscopic images of human brain tissue.
• Polymath Plus Platform enabling collaborative mathematical discovery that builds on the original Polymath Project. Introduces AI-assisted, interactive, graph-based representations of proofs to improve collaboration at scale.
• CrowdMeter Mobile app and research effort that explores how shared crowd signals can help people make informed choices about crowded places and public health decisions.
• Civium Integration platform concept for sustainable human computation that connects stakeholders, tasks, and outcomes across participatory systems.
• Crowd2Map Tanzania Crowdsourced mapping initiative to improve OpenStreetMap coverage in rural Tanzania, supporting development and community safety efforts.
• Dream Catchers Online game using crowdsourcing to advance Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) research while spreading awareness of safe sleep guidelines.
• Human Computation Journal Transdisciplinary peer-reviewed journal published by the institute, serving as an international forum for high-quality scholarly articles in all areas of human computation.
• Handbook of Human Computation, 2nd Edition Second edition of the comprehensive reference work on human computation, edited by the institute's founder, covering foundations, application domains, techniques, infrastructure, algorithms, participation, analysis, policy, and impact.

Quantifiable outcome

• Alzheimer's research acceleration through crowdsourced blood vessel movie analysis
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers5 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability7 records

Feature4 records

Partnerships

Ten partnerships are on record, tiered core, major and minor.

• Cornell UniversitycoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerMajor academic partner; collaboration on Stall Catchers project with the Schaffer-Nishimura Lab for Alzheimer's research; includes faculty participation from Chris B. Schaffer (Associate Professor, Biomedical Engineering) and Oliver Bracko (Alzheimer's researcher)
• Microsoft ResearchcoreTechnology or IntegrationTechnology partner providing research collaboration and technical expertise for human computation initiatives
• UC DaviscoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerAcademic partner collaborating on Beta Catchers project with the Dugger Lab for Alzheimer's pathology research
• BrightFocus FoundationmajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerNonprofit foundation supporting Alzheimer's research in partnership with HCI's citizen science initiatives
• Renaissance PhilanthropycoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerPrimary funder and partner for the Polymath Plus project enabling collaborative mathematical discovery
• SciStartermajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerCitizen science organization partner; connection to External Professor Darlene Cavalier who is Founding Director
• MicrosoftmajorGTM or Marketing PartnerCorporate partner providing support for research and technology initiatives (distinct from Microsoft Research)
• Aspen Tech Policy HubminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerPolicy-focused partner supporting technology policy initiatives related to human computation
• National Science AcademyminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerNational science organization partner supporting research initiatives
• Doug Engelbart InstitutemajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerConnected through Christina Engelbart who advises on HCI activities; honors the legacy of Doug Engelbart and his vision for augmenting human collaboration

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves5 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Zooniverse: The largest online citizen-science platform, hosted at the University of Oxford, offering crowdsourced analysis across dozens of research projects. Most directly comparable to HCI's Stall Catchers/Beta Catchers model in both method (volunteer-powered image/video classification) and mission (accelerating academic research).
• Massively Multiplayer Online Science (MMOS): Swiss platform converting citizen-science tasks into online games; led by Attila Szantner, who is an HCI External Professor. Direct peer in gamifying volunteer-driven scientific analysis.
• eBird (Cornell Lab of Ornithology): Citizen-science platform from Cornell Lab of Ornithology collecting bird observations from volunteers worldwide. HCI shares Cornell affiliation and the citizen-science-for-research methodology, making it a peer in operating model and institutional lineage.
• Stardust@Home: UC Berkeley citizen-science project enlisting volunteers to search for interstellar dust particles in aerogel. Closely analogous to Stall Catchers in crowdsourcing visual/microscopic classification for scientific discovery.
• Foldit: University of Washington citizen-science game in which players fold proteins to contribute to biochemistry research. Direct analog to Stall Catchers — gamified crowdsourcing for biomedical discovery — making it a strong functional peer.
• DrivenData: Data-science competition platform focused on social-impact and research challenges (e.g., wildlife conservation, public health). An HCI partner; comparable in applying human+machine analytical crowdsourcing to research questions of societal importance.
• SciStarter: Citizen-science hub connecting volunteers to thousands of projects across disciplines. Listed as an HCI partner and led by an HCI External Professor, making it the closest operational peer in volunteer mobilization and project discovery.
• InnoCentive: Crowdsourced problem-solving platform (now part of Wazoku) connecting organizations to solvers for research and innovation challenges. Comparable to HCI in outsourcing analytical work to a distributed human network for hard problems.

Broad incumbents

• Amazon Mechanical Turk: General-purpose crowdsourcing marketplace used by researchers to distribute micro-tasks. Provides similar infrastructure-level capabilities to HCI's platforms but lacks the research-domain specialization and nonprofit mission.
• Kaggle: Google-owned data-science competition and community platform. Overlaps with HCI in crowdsourcing analytical work, but operates at vastly larger scale and as a commercial platform rather than a nonprofit citizen-science institute.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• YouTubeyoutube.com/channel/UCgQRg8zV9xCQJlZdJ1NKK6Q

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles6 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

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M&A

Investments

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Frequently asked questions about Human Computation Institute