Unfortunately, there were no Illinois winners this year. Next year? -ML March 13, 2001 Connecticut Girl Wins $100,000 in Intel Contest ASHINGTON, March 12 � A 17- year-old high school senior from Westport, Conn., who used two wires and a stereo speaker to study electron transport in tiny nanostructures took first prize and a $100,000 college scholarship today in the Intel Science Talent Search. She and three other students from the New York metropolitan region won 4 of the top 10 places in the national competition. Out of 40 finalists, 13 were from New York, 2 were from Connecticut and 2 were from Pennsylvania. The perennial powerhouses Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan and the Bronx High School of Science were shut out of the top 10. The first-place winner, Mariangela Lisanti, a senior from Staples High School in Westport, submitted a project on the use of single atoms or molecules to fabricate electronic devices. Intel officials said that Ms. Lisanti, who conducted her research at Yale University, developed a new measurement apparatus for allowing data acquisition at an unprecedented rate � 86 million points per 24 hours. "I'm living a dream just getting here," Ms. Lisanti said before learning that she had won. She added that she had been working toward the Intel competition since the eighth grade. She said the equipment for her experiment cost about $35. "My work on the small scale could lead to further miniaturization of electronics," Ms. Lisanti said. Second prize and a $75,000 scholarship went to Nathaniel J. Craig, 18, a senior at Mira Loma High School in Sacramento, for a project on the thermodynamics of glass-forming liquids; third prize and $50,000 went to Gabriel D. Carroll, 18, of Oakland Technical High School in Oakland, Calif., for his research on the shape of related geometric space. In addition to Ms. Lisanti, other students from the New York region in the top 10 included Vinod E. Nambudiri, 17, of Blind Brook High School in Rye Brook, N.Y., who finished sixth and won $25,000 for a behavioral and social science project on the effects of light on sleeping teenagers; Johanna B. Waldman, 17, of Roslyn High School in Roslyn, on Long Island, who finished seventh and won $20,000 for her examination of social factors in academic cheating among high school students; and David N. Khalil, 18, of Great Neck North High School on Long Island, who finished 10th and won $20,000 for his project using magnetic resonance imaging to study the human brain. Many of the 40 finalists came from schools that teach students how to do scientific research, often pair them with professional mentors and help them prepare specifically for competitions like the Intel competition, formerly known as the Westinghouse Science Talent Search. In fourth place was Alan M. Dunn, 17, a student at Montgomery Blair High School in Potomac, Md., who received $25,000 for his computer science project on advanced encryption and algorithms, and in fifth place was Michael T. Hasper, 18, of the Maclay School in Tallahassee, Fla., who won $25,000 for his physics project, which compared the sound qualities of 11 violin bridges that he made from wood, metal and other materials. In eighth place was Hans C. Lee, 18, of the York School of Carmel, Calif., who won $20,000 for an engineering project that tested differential torque control systems to improve a car's handling when traction is poor or during radical steering maneuvers, and in ninth place was Robert A. Horch, 18, of Weatherford, Tex., a student at Texas Academy of Mathematics and Science who won $20,000 for a project that combined clay and nickel to create a material lighter and 20 percent stronger than stainless steel. The remaining 30 finalists will receive $5,000 scholarships. The finalists were judged by a team led by Dr. Andrew Yeager, a physician and director of stem transplantation at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, and Douglas D. Osheroff, a Stanford University professor and a 1996 Nobel laureate in physics. The talent search was formerly sponsored by the Westinghouse Electric Corporation and was taken over by Intel in 1998. Intel gave $330,000 in scholarships and equipment in the competition two years ago, but has almost quadrupled the amount to $1.25 million this year. -- This is the ISTA-talk mailing list. To unsubscribe: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For more information: <http://www.ista-il.org/about/mail_list.html> To search the archives: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/>
