Intel-ISEF 2011 Honors High School Science Fair Winners

The Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF), the world’s largest high school science competition, and a program of Society for Science & the Public, announced its top winners at the Los Angeles Convention Center on May 11^th.

Over 1500 students from grades 9-12 earned the right to compete at the Intel ISEF 2011 by winning top prize at a local, regional, state or national science fairs.  They were selected from 443 affiliate fairs in 65 countries, regions and territories.

In the General Awards competition, a team from Lafayette, CA received the Gordon E. Moore Award, a $75,000 prize in honor of the Intel co-founder and retired chairman and CEO.  In addition, a team from Thailand, and one individual from Reno, NV were named Intel Foundation Young Scientist Award winners and each received prizes of $50,000.  In all, over 400 finalists received awards and prizes for their groundbreaking work.   Awards included 17 "Best of Category" winners who each received a $5,000 prize.  The Intel Foundation also awarded a $1,000 grant to each winner’s school and the Intel ISEF-affiliated fair they represented.

Besides the General Awards, the Intel-ISEF Special Awards were presented by nearly 70 scientific, professional and educational organizations, and included scholarships, summer internships, equipment grants, and trips.

Several INCOSE members from around the country served as volunteer judges in a show of support for STEM education in Los Angeles.  Mark Gallo and Dr. Karen Miller represented INCOSE-LA as volunteer Special Awards judges at Intel-ISEF 2011.  Other INCOSE volunteers from around the country included Fred Brown; Bill Mackey; Dorothy McKinney; Stan Settles; John Walker; Judy Walker; Julie Walker.

The INCOSE Special Awards were given to engineering projects in the following categories: Electrical; Mechanical; Bioengineering; Environmental Management; and Energy and Transportation.  The emphasis was on projects that involved characterizing, designing, building, modifying or testing a clearly identifiable complex system in which the system’s utility to society was clearly apparent.  Special consideration was given to systems that could be built, modified, and/or redesigned to solve a societal (stakeholder) need, and that were based on established Systems Engineering processes, practices and tools. 

The INCOSE First Award of $1,500 was awarded to Ms. Kelles Diane Gordge, 16, of Great Mills High School in Maryland, for “Critical Point of View: A System for in vivo Monitoring of Lung Sounds in Critical Care Patients.”   

Kelles’ project was clearly modeled after the system engineering process.  Her methodology was prominently featured on her display, and she was able to address the system engineering principles and answer the questions directed to her without hesitation.  She validated signal processing algorithms which distinguish different types of lung-produced sounds.  She displayed remarkable grasp of the biomedical principles involved, and successfully applied sophisticated frequency/time domain techniques in developing her diagnostic algorithms.  Her next steps involve producing an in vivo (body mounted) prototype that can acquire and evaluate data from test subjects in real time.  INCOSE looks forward to evaluating her progress at the 2012 ISEF.

INCOSE also awarded several Certificates of Honorable Mention.

Marian Joan Bechtel, 16, Hempfield High School, Landisville PA, won for “A Stand-Off Seismo-Acoustic Method for Humanitarian De-mining.”

Marian is clearly very passionate about the de-mining issue, and seemed genuinely eager to find new approaches for detecting plastic mines and non-traditional threats.  She considered the real needs of the mine searchers, and devised an operational approach that was pragmatic and effective.  Marian's extensive trades and iterative testing and refinements made a big impression.  She spoke enthusiastically about this opportunity to showcase her project.  The data was well organized and her systems process was easy to follow.  Her project was clearly a complex system, and she applied system thinking, tools and techniques throughout her work.

Marian plans to continue validating and refining the techniques, and perhaps extending them to other applications.  Marian got the idea for her land-mine detector while playing the piano. She noticed that when she hit certain chords, a banjo hanging on the wall would resonate — and realized she could use the same principle to search for underground mines.  She also was a $1000 third-place prize in the electrical and mechanical engineering category of the General Awards competition.

David Alexandre Joseph Campeau, 16, Mayo High School, Rochester MN, won an INCOSE award for “Brain Computer Interface.”

David's project was a fine example of systems engineering methodology.  While other projects also explored brain wave signal acquisition and evaluation, David's project was by far the best organized and presented.  David made extensive use of computer simulations prior to prototyping that helped guide his trades and selections.  His needs analysis, concept development, and system evaluation approaches were well explained, and his extensive trades are ongoing.  He seemed to be refining his next steps as he was being interviewed.  His verbal, written and presentation skills were excellent.  The judges were very impressed by his extensive use of trades and iterative testing and evaluation.

Other INCOSE Special Awards included:

“Electromagnetic Detection of Aquifers ,” Alexander Kent Kendrick, 18, Los Alamos High School, Los Alamos NM.

“Design & Construction of an Improved Point-of-Use Antimicrobial Water Purification System,” Jonathan Charles Fuqua, 18, Nicolet High School, Glendale WI.

“Robotic Assistant for the Visually-Impaired (RAVI): A Novel System Employing Digital Image Processing and Sonar Range Detection,” Ishwarya Ananthabhotla, 18, Kings Park High School, Kings Park NY.

“Navibot, Phase IV,” Matthew Joseph Hummel, 17, Florence High School #14-1, Florence SD.

“Water for the World: Developing a Portable, Solar Powered Desalination Unit,” Ryan Christopher Erickson, 17, Los Alamos High School, Los Alamos NM.

“Autonomous Robotic Vehicle, Saving Lives, Preventing Accidents One at a Time,” Jessica Alexis Richeri, 17, Centennial High School, Corona CA.

“Thermoprocessing Prototype Plant for the Sugar Cane Bagasse Aiming the Production of Dimethyl ether,” Lucas Ribeiro Mata, 17, Instituto Federal de Educacao, Brazil.

“Accounting for Cross-talk between Signaling Pathways Identifies Novel Model for Early and Late Post-transplant Acute Rejection,” Andrew Liu, 17, Henry M. Gunn Senior High School, Palo Alto CA.

“eHeart: ECG Signal Processing System for Automatic Detection of Cardiac Abnormalities,” Vamsi Chunduru, 17, Capital High School, Olympia WA.

“Optimization of a Microbial Fuel Cell to Drive a Bioelectrochemically Assisted Wastewater Treatment Reactor,” Ryota Ishizuka, 17, Greenwich High School, Greenwich CT.