{rfName}
Cr

License and Use

Icono OpenAccess

Altmetrics

Analysis of institutional authors

Angel Luengo-Oroz, MiguelAuthor

Share

June 9, 2019
Publications
>
Article

Crowdsourcing Malaria Parasite Quantification: An Online Game for Analyzing Images of Infected Thick Blood Smears

Publicated to: JOURNAL OF MEDICAL INTERNET RESEARCH. 14 (6): 207-219 - 2012-12-01 14(6), DOI: 10.2196/jmir.2338

Authors:

Luengo-Oroz, MA; Arranz, A; Frean, J
[+]

Affiliations

CIBER BBN, Biomed Res Networking Ctr Bioengn Biomat & Nanome - Author
Nebutek Soluc SL - Author
Univ Witwatersrand, Fac Hlth Sci, Sch Pathol - Author
See more

Abstract

Background: There are 600,000 new malaria cases daily worldwide. The gold standard for estimating the parasite burden and the corresponding severity of the disease consists in manually counting the number of parasites in blood smears through a microscope, a process that can take more than 20 minutes of an expert microscopist's time. Objective: This research tests the feasibility of a crowdsourced approach to malaria image analysis. In particular, we investigated whether anonymous volunteers with no prior experience would be able to count malaria parasites in digitized images of thick blood smears by playing a Web-based game. Methods: The experimental system consisted of a Web-based game where online volunteers were tasked with detecting parasites in digitized blood sample images coupled with a decision algorithm that combined the analyses from several players to produce an improved collective detection outcome. Data were collected through the MalariaSpot website. Random images of thick blood films containing Plasmodium falciparum at medium to low parasitemias, acquired by conventional optical microscopy, were presented to players. In the game, players had to find and tag as many parasites as possible in 1 minute. In the event that players found all the parasites present in the image, they were presented with a new image. In order to combine the choices of different players into a single crowd decision, we implemented an image processing pipeline and a quorum algorithm that judged a parasite tagged when a group of players agreed on its position. Results: Over 1 month, anonymous players from 95 countries played more than 12,000 games and generated a database of more than 270,000 clicks on the test images. Results revealed that combining 22 games from nonexpert players achieved a parasite counting accuracy higher than 99%. This performance could be obtained also by combining 13 games from players trained for 1 minute. Exhaustive computations measured the parasite counting accuracy for all players as a function of the number of games considered and the experience of the players. In addition, we propose a mathematical equation that accurately models the collective parasite counting performance. Conclusions: This research validates the online gaming approach for crowdsourced counting of malaria parasites in images of thick blood films. The findings support the conclusion that nonexperts are able to rapidly learn how to identify the typical features of malaria parasites in digitized thick blood samples and that combining the analyses of several users provides similar parasite counting accuracy rates as those of expert microscopists. This experiment illustrates the potential of the crowdsourced gaming approach for performing routine malaria parasite quantification, and more generally for solving biomedical image analysis problems, with future potential for telediagnosis related to global health challenges.(J Med Internet Res 2012;14(6):e167) doi:10.2196/jmir.2338
[+]

Keywords

AnimalsCrowdsourcingDiscoveryGames for healthImage analysisMalariaMathematical morphologyMicroscopyPlasmodium falciparumPlayersTelepathology

Quality index

Bibliometric impact. Analysis of the contribution and dissemination channel

The work has been published in the journal JOURNAL OF MEDICAL INTERNET RESEARCH due to its progression and the good impact it has achieved in recent years, according to the agency WoS (JCR), it has become a reference in its field. In the year of publication of the work, 2012, it was in position 4/83, thus managing to position itself as a Q1 (Primer Cuartil), in the category Health Care Sciences & Services.

From a relative perspective, and based on the normalized impact indicator calculated from World Citations provided by WoS (ESI, Clarivate), it yields a value for the citation normalization relative to the expected citation rate of: 2.58. This indicates that, compared to works in the same discipline and in the same year of publication, it ranks as a work cited above average. (source consulted: ESI Nov 13, 2025)

This information is reinforced by other indicators of the same type, which, although dynamic over time and dependent on the set of average global citations at the time of their calculation, consistently position the work at some point among the top 50% most cited in its field:

  • Weighted Average of Normalized Impact by the Scopus agency: 2.42 (source consulted: FECYT Mar 2025)

Specifically, and according to different indexing agencies, this work has accumulated citations as of 2026-04-24, the following number of citations:

  • WoS: 87
  • Scopus: 92
  • Europe PMC: 37
[+]

Impact and social visibility

From the perspective of influence or social adoption, and based on metrics associated with mentions and interactions provided by agencies specializing in calculating the so-called "Alternative or Social Metrics," we can highlight as of 2026-04-24:

  • The use, from an academic perspective evidenced by the Altmetric agency indicator referring to aggregations made by the personal bibliographic manager Mendeley, gives us a total of: 142.
  • The use of this contribution in bookmarks, code forks, additions to favorite lists for recurrent reading, as well as general views, indicates that someone is using the publication as a basis for their current work. This may be a notable indicator of future more formal and academic citations. This claim is supported by the result of the "Capture" indicator, which yields a total of: 142 (PlumX).

With a more dissemination-oriented intent and targeting more general audiences, we can observe other more global scores such as:

  • The Total Score from Altmetric: 139.
  • The number of mentions on the social network Facebook: 8 (Altmetric).
  • The number of mentions on the social network X (formerly Twitter): 140 (Altmetric).

It is essential to present evidence supporting full alignment with institutional principles and guidelines on Open Science and the Conservation and Dissemination of Intellectual Heritage. A clear example of this is:

  • The work has been submitted to a journal whose editorial policy allows open Open Access publication.
  • Assignment of a Handle/URN as an identifier within the deposit in the Institutional Repository: https://oa.upm.es/15976/

As a result of the publication of the work in the institutional repository, statistical usage data has been obtained that reflects its impact. In terms of dissemination, we can state that, as of

  • Views: 538
  • Downloads: 561
[+]

Leadership analysis of institutional authors

This work has been carried out with international collaboration, specifically with researchers from: South African Republic.

There is a significant leadership presence as some of the institution’s authors appear as the first or last signer, detailed as follows: First Author (Luengo Oroz, Miguel Angel) .

[+]

Awards linked to the item

This research was partially funded by the Picata program from the Moncloa Campus of International Excellence, Universidad Politecnica de Madrid and Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain; and the project TEC2010-1619- C04-03 from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation.
[+]