Each of the three projects Manhasset High School entered in the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair last weekend in Phoenix, Ariz. earned awards, school officials said.
Though two project groups were recognized as winners in the Environmental Management and Environmental Sciences categories of the competition, all three were honored by Sigma Xi, an international honor society founded in 1886 that offers awards based on the best demonstration of interdisciplinary research, said science research advisor Peter Guastella.
“For Manhasset, it was another great showing,” Guastella said. “We were very proud and honored to have done so well there. The competition receives more than 1,600 projects and all three of ours were recognized by Sigma Xi, which doesn’t give awards to everybody.”
Students Archie Kong, Randy Tung and Arthur Wang won second prize in the Environmental Management category for their research on the effects of single-walled carbon nanotubes on the regeneration activity of three organisms,
Kong, Tung and Wang won $1,500 for their project and will have a minor planet named after them within the Ceres Connection, discovered by the Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research Program of MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory, Guastella said.
Kong, Tung and Wang’s project was recognized as an honorable mention by Sigma Xi.
Manhasset student Albert Kim and Herricks High School student Ho Jung won fourth place in the Environmental Sciences category for their gene tests suggesting that the environmental toxin 4-Nonylphenol may promote inflammatory bowel disease.
Kim and Jung were the recipients of $500 for the prize and won Sigma Xi’s First Life Science Award, in the amount of $2,000.
Karalyn Nicole Pappas and Stephanie Ying won Sigma Xi’s Second Life Sciences Award, a prize of $1,000, for their findings on the effects of riluzole and superoxide dismutase on ALS growth in C. Elegans.
