Category Awards

2021 Winners

Life Sciences

Animal Sciences

Senior Division

First Place: Swetha Velayutham & Vyshnavi Poruri | Plano East Senior High School | The Effect of PAR-4 on the Fertility and Progeny of C.elegans as a Potential Therapeutic Agent for Hereditary Chronic Inflammatory Diseases
Second Place: Zaina Siddiqi & Rotem Ris | Academy of Science and Technology | The Effects of Curcumin on the Regeneration of Dugesia tigrina Succeeding Exposure to Ionizing Radiation
Third Place: Vaishnuv Thiagarajan | Westwood High School | Simarouba Amara as a Novel Therapeutic and Preventive Agent against Carcinogenesis in Planaria (Dugesia Dorotocephala)

Junior Division

First Place: Adam Siddiqi | McCullough Junior High School | The Effects of Lead Contamination on the Regeneration of H. littoralis
Second Place: Maya Haws | Mt. Sacred Heart School | Are Birds and Squirrels Attracted to a Certain Color?
Third Place: Yash Dharankar | Rice Middle School | Comparison of Varroa Mite Treatments for Honey Bees

Behavioral and Social Sciences

Senior Division

First Place: Sidhya Peddinti | Plano East Senior High School | ParkinSensor: Computer Vision and Ensemble Machine Learning-Based Early Diagnosis for Parkinson’s Disease using Neuromuscular Biomarkers
Second Place: Siddhanth Pachipala | Academy of Science and Technology | Prediction of Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) Through Prosodic and Linguistic Machine Learning Models
Third Place: Pranav Somani | Academy of Science and Technology | A Novel Bio-signal Based Machine Learning System for the Detection, Tracking and Intervention of Anxiety Disorders

Junior Division

First Place: Ramya Elangovan | Thomas Horace Rogers School | Effect of “Stress Management And Relaxation Techniques” (SMART): Mindfulness Meditation and Progressive Muscle Relaxation on Memory and Vital Signs in Intensive Care Providers during COVID-19 — A Three-Arm, Prospective Randomized Controlled Trial
Second Place: Siri Peddinti | Otto Middle School | PiRest – An Eye Fatigue Alert Device Using Computer Vision
Third Place: Sumayyah Jilani | Harmony Academy – Euless Middle School | The Primacy and Recency Effects

Biochemistry

Senior Division

First Place: Suran Somawardana | Basis San Antonio High School | Wearable Electrochemical Sweat Sensor for Patients with Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD): Year II
Second Place: Sophia Zhang & Ashley Zhang | Jasper High School | The Effects of Aqueous Plant Extracts on the Inhibition of α-Amylase’s Ability to Hydrolyze Alpha-linked Polysaccharides
Third Place: Noah Mathai | Plano West Senior High School | Agar-Ponics: Novel Agarose-based Agricultural System Synergizing Soil Integrated GM-Bacteria and Aquaponics

Junior Division

First Place: Samuel Grine | Lincoln Middle School | I’m in a Pickle
Second Place: Melina Kumar | Brookside Intermediate School | Reducing the Risk of Diabetes: A Novel Approach for the Development of a Sensitive Glucagon ELISA
Third Place: Shravan Manoj | Murphy Middle School | Which Disinfectant Material Works Best in Killing Bacteria?

Biomedical and Health Sciences

Senior Division

First Place: Richard Lin | Bellaire Senior High School | Microbial-based Cancer Therapy
Second Place: Kaden Legore | Seguin High School | Mask Mitigation
Third Place: Aaditya Arun | Harmony School of Innovation – Sugar Land | Effect of Excess Fluoride on Reproductive Outcome

Junior Division

First Place: Sharmada Palakurthi | Baker Middle School | A Novel Non-Invasive Method of Testing Glucose For Diabetic Population
Second Place: Savera Karia | Spring Branch Academic Institute Middle School | Can β-D-Glucans, a Protein Found in Dates, Inhibit Cancer Cell Proliferation?
Third Place: Gracelynn Singer | Isbill Junior High School | Were You Raised in a Barn?

Cellular and Molecular Biology

Senior Division

First Place: Parisa Vaziri | Plano East Senior High School | The Neuro-Protective Role of Select Transcription Factors in a PINK1 Loss-of-Function Based Model of Neurodegeneration in Drosophila Melanogaster
Second Place: Paridhi Latawa | Lasa High School | Identification of Synovial Tissue-based Biomarkers for Rheumatoid Arthritis
Third Place: Maegha Tipirneni | Friendswood High School | Effect of Smoking on TGF-β Signaling in Breast Cancer Patients

Junior Division

First Place: Mariem Banales | McAllen – Cathey Middle School | Family Fingerprint Patterns
Second Place: Brooklyn Thompson | Atlanta Middle School | The Effect of Masks on Respiration
Third Place: Cuauhtemoc Zamora | Kaffie Middle School | The Effects of Heat Shock on Plasmid Uptake

Computational Biology and Bioinformatics

Senior Division

First Place: Govardhan Poondi & John Rho | Plano West Senior High School | Non-Invasive, Two-Channel EEG Hearing Aid to Address the Cocktail Party Problem via Multi-Speaker Auditory Attention Decoding
Second Place: Russell Li | St. John’s School High School | Deep Neural Network for Robust Single-Cell DNA Methylation Detection
Third Place: Hannah Guan | Basis San Antonio High School | The Genetics of Human Aging: Predicting Age and Age-Related Diseases by Deep Mining High Dimensional Biomarker Data

Junior Division

First Place: Shaumprovo Debnath | Keystone Middle School | Using Machine Learning and Neural Data from the Brain to Create an Artificial Intelligence Capable of Recognizing Thought Words
Second Place: Caroline Garcia | John Drugan School | Insect Armageddon in the Sun City

Earth and Environmental Sciences

Senior Division

First Place: Sriya Teerdhala & Sanja Hiremath | Plano East Senior High School | A Third Year Study on the Bioremediation of Tetracycline Polluted Soils: How Antibiotic Resistance can Reduce Antibiotic Pollution in the Environment and a Solution to Antibiotic-Pollution Related Crop Failure
Second Place: Keshav Chandrasekhara | Uplift North Hills High School | Which Organic Sorbent Most Effectively Complements Triton X-100 Surfactant in Removing Oil in Oil Spills?
Third Place: Aseel Rawashdeh | Anderson High School | Larvicidal “Trojan-horse”: Experimentally Developing a Novel Low-Cost and Eco-Friendly Mosquito Vector Control Treatment

Junior Division

First Place: Josephine Schultz | Bradley Middle School | Effect of Light Pollution on Chrysalis Stage of Painted Lady Butterfly
Second Place: Joaquin Martinez | Lincoln Middle School | Hydroponics or Standard Agriculture; Which Yields Larger Fields?
Third Place: Nitya Kaligotla | McCullough Junior High School | Does Biodegradable Plastic affect Plant Growth?

Microbiology

Senior Division

First Place: Shriya Bhat | Plano East Senior High School | Combating Bacterial Biofilm II: Generating a Non-toxic Multi-pathway Targeted Cocktail Treatment to Inhibit Proliferation of Pseudomonas Biofilm
Second Place: Lamisa Mahmud | Pflugerville High School | Comparing the Effects of Microbial Biofortification Techniques on the Nitrogen Levels and Germination of Brassicaceae Microgreens
Third Place: Weixuan Yan | Plano West Senior High School | A Machine Learning Approach to Optimize CRISPR-Cas13d RNA Targeting as an Antiviral Therapeutics

Junior Division

First Place: Madeleine Mack | China Spring Middle School | A Comparative Analysis of Edible Triglyceride-Based Preservatives: Evaluating Bos Taurus and Gallus Gallus Domesticus
Second Place: Lyla Arnold | Young Women’s Leadership Academy Middle School | Bioluminescent Responses to LED Stimuli on Pyrocystis Fusiformis
Third Place: Pavan Ahluwalia | Harmony School of Innovation Middle School – Fort Worth | Comparative Evaluation of Salt Water Rinse with Cetylpyridinium Chloride Against Oral Microbes

Plant Sciences

Senior Division

First Place: Zach Vazhekatt | Coppell High School | Longevity Of Plant-Based Bioremediation In Water
Second Place: Keira Tran | Pflugerville High School | The Effect of Concentrations of Copper-Contaminated Soil on Vigna Unguiculata and Phaseolus Lunatus Growth and Brine Shrimp Mortality
Third Place: Lorenzo Huerta | Austin High School | The Effect of Type of Substrate on Growth of Radishes

Junior Division

First Place: Stephen Sims | Saint Matthew Catholic School | The Use of Abscicic Acid and UV Light in Plant’s Growth and Improved Water Usage
Second Place: Itzel Ramos | McAllen – Fossum Middle School | The Influence of Artificial Light on Hydroponics
Third Place: Prisha Bhat | Otto Middle School | Phytoremediation: An Affordable Non-Toxic Approach to Extracting Heavy Metals from Soil using Hyperaccumulators with Chelating Agents in Situ

Translational Medical Sciences

Senior Division

First Place: Sameer Parameshwar, Venu Poruri & Sridatta Teerdhala | Plano East Senior High School | ProteCount: An AI-Based Reader for Rapid Protein Quantification
Second Place: Kevin Song | Debakey High School for Health Professions | Immunotherapy of Human Prostate Cancer Utilizing the Bacterial Protein Flagellin
Third Place: Kashish Kumar | Science Academy High School | Human iPSC-Derived Cardiomyocyte Model Reveals the Transcriptomic Bases of SARS-CoV-2 Infection Induced Myocardial Injury

Junior Division

First Place: Kaveesh Koswatta | Koswatta Home School – Middle School | Mask Filtration Efficiency Toward Preventing Community Spread of Pathogens
Second Place: Elizabeth Reilly | Saint Matthew Catholic School | The Role of Leech Saliva and Shisho in the Inflammation and Healing of Diabetic Wounds
Third Place: Christopher McDonald | John Drugan School | Sleep Deprivation and Its Effects on Physical and Cognitive Function

Physical Sciences

Biomedical Engineering

Senior Division

First Place: Aditya Chebrolu | Independence High School | FallWatch: A Novel Approach for Through-Wall Fall Detection in Real-Time for the Elderly using Artificial Intelligence
Second Place: Alay Shah | Plano West Senior High School | Generating Functional MRI (fMRI) Images via Eye-Tracking Classification for Artificial Brain Scans
Third Place: Ibrahim Al-Akash | Veteran’s Memorial High School | Max Health: Developing a User-Friendly Smartphone and Smartwatch Application with Intelligent Textiles Biosensors to Detect Arrhythmias, Dysglycemia, Neurological Disorders, and Predict Asthma Attack Risk

Junior Division

First Place: Donovan Burke | Knox Junior High School | An Innovative Mask Design to Safely Scope Patients
Second Place: Federico Romero & Diego Romero | Kaffie Middle School | Optimizing Leverage and Strength In An Articulating Prosthetic
Third Place: Alazne Gallegos | SSG Manuel R. Puentes Middle School | Relax in Your Mask

Chemistry

Senior Division

First Place: Zhi-Wei Zeng | Zeng Homeschool | Keeping our water away from FOG
Second Place: Madelyn Puza | Academy of Science and Technology | Production of Alternative Bioplastics Enhanced by Corn Stover Materials and Natural Fibers
Third Place: Anjali Iyer | Jasper High School | Antibiotic Apocalypse: The Treatment of Antibiotic-Resistant Diseases via ROS-mediated Cell Wall Damage through the Phytochemical Constituent Eugenol in a Drug Synergism

Junior Division

First Place: Ryan Lee | Vandeventer Middle School | Natural pH Indicator
Second Place: Sandul Manage | Knox Junior High School | Vitamin C in Juice
Third Place: Curtis Chui | Canyon Ridge Middle School | Density and Heat Capacity

Embedded Systems

Senior Division

First Place: Anushka Sridhar | Plano East Senior High School | Smart Parkinson’s Strap- to Dynamically Detect and Mitigate the Tremors of Parkinson’s Patients
Second Place: Aneesh Vanguri | Westwood High School | Using Sensory Substitution to Create an Electronic Navigation Aid for the Visually Impaired
Third Place: Abrar Rahman | Harmony School of Endeavor High School – Austin | Wearables for Parkinson’s Disease Monitoring

Junior Division

First Place: Eunice-Jia-Min Yong | West Ridge Middle School | Safe Scan
Second Place: Daniel Tauhert | Renner Middle School | Smart Handwashing System
Third Place: Amelia Krajmalnik & Morgan Bowers | Frankford Middle School | Catching Canine Cancer

Energy: Sustainable Materials & Design

Senior Division

First Place: Greyson Wong | Williams High School | The Optimal Structural Design of an Energy Efficient and Aerodynamic Solar Car
Second Place: Rishab Ghosh | Academy of Science and Technology | Microalgal Lipids: The Effects of Cultivation Temperature on Microalgal Lipid Production for Biofuel
Third Place: Namila Rahmani | Science Academy High School | Perovskite Material Based Piezoelectric and Triboelectric Energy Film for Energy Harvesting

Junior Division

First Place: Inu Baek | Knox Junior High School | Reducing Energy Consumption with Condition-Based Illumination
Second Place: Jude Sadi | Austin Peace Academy Middle School | Motion, Motion What’s Your Commotion?: Converting Motion Energy into Electricity
Third Place: Eric Ng | Hendrick Middle School | Eco Friendly House Designs

Engineering Mechanics

Senior Division

First Place: Ved Ganesh | Dulles High School | Stable Shores: An Experimental Set-Up to Test Economical Alternatives to Conventional Coastal Erosion Control
Second Place: Joyce Wong & Alisa Noro | Academy of Science and Technology | Assessing the Efficacy of Tsunami Mitigations Using Computational Fluid Dynamics
Third Place: Felipe Aceves | Academy of Science and Technology | Applying Ionization and an Electrical Field to Design and Construct an Ionic Thruster Propelled by Air

Junior Division

First Place: Aarushi Pandey | McCullough Junior High School | Intelligent and Autonomous Firefighting Rescue Vehicle
Second Place: Jordan Thomas | Harmony School of Innovation Middle School – Fort Worth | Hydropower: Putting Water to Work
Third Place: Sarina Mih | Challenger School Middle School – Avery Ranch | What’s the Stitch?

Environmental Engineering

Senior Division

First Place: Scout Skaggs | Granbury High School | A Hybrid Bioplastic and Its Properties
Second Place: Nandini Ramachandran & Mukund Ramachandran | Plano West Senior High School | Building a Dual-Axis Solar Tracker Enabled by a Gradient Boosting ML Model to Increase the Electricity Generated by Solar Panels
Third Place: Mehaa Amirthalingam | Travis High School | Retrofitting an existing single family home with Grey Water Collection from the Shower and Studying the Efficiency and Issues of Recycling Grey Water for Toilet Flushing after Microfiltration

Junior Division

First Place: Saachit Rathi, Nagavenkat Modugula & Aren Nag | Otto Middle School | Autonomous Flying with Pixhawk and Raspberry Pi – Object Detection Using Tensorflow and OpenCV for Real World Problem Solving
Second Place: Gwen Rodriguez | Harmony Science Academy – El Paso Middle School | Using Fruit to Purify Drinking Water
Third Place: Ella Sanders | Isbill Junior High School | Smoke Filtration with Plants

Materials Science

Senior Division

First Place: Christopher Huh | Westwood High School | Carbon Dioxide Conversion to Hydrocarbon Fuel Utilizing Metal Catalyst
Second Place: Aithreya Thoppay | Jasper High School | A Novel Hydrophobic Corn Stover Sponge With the Implementation of Iron Oxide Nanoparticles and Various Alterations in Material Chemistry
Third Place: Sohi Patel | Academy of Science and Technology | Scalable and Sustainable Synthesis of a Novel, Bio-Based Polyurethane Foam System Incorporating Industrial Byproducts and Waste

Junior Division

First Place: Justin Huff | China Spring Middle School | Evaluating the Impact of Paint finish on Thermodynamics of Habitable Structures
Second Place: Ashley Thomas | Haggard Middle School | Don’t Slip
Third Place: Halil Tunc | Harmony School of Endeavor Middle School – Austin | Lead vs. Aluminum Radiation Blocker

Mathematics

Senior Division

First Place: Shrey Joshi & Ishaan Javali | Plano East Senior High School | GLAS: A Global Landslide Analytics System
Second Place: Pratham Babaria & Ethan Chandra | Harmony School of Endeavor High School – Austin | A Mathematically Driven Physical Analysis and Confirmation Study of Exoplanet HD 189733 b and Others in Close-By Star Systems Using Principles of Machine Learning/Linear Algebra, Bayesian Statistical Tests, and Computational Python Programming
Third Place: Amitha Mandava | Plano East Senior High School | An Efficient Loop-Based Bus Transit Routing Network

Junior Division

First Place: Abigail Olmstead | Greater Waco Christian Home Educators – Middle School | Can Cuteness be Calculated? – The Golden Ratio in Baby Animal Facial Proportions
Second Place: Paul Gonzales | Pflugerville Middle School | Stars and Their Habitable Zones
Third Place: Aryan Rajpal & Simon Farruqui | Pearson Middle School | Using Graph Theory to Create a Solution in Routing Internet Traffic

Physics and Astronomy

Senior Division

First Place: Sam Christian | Lasa High School | A Possible Alignment Between Orbits of Visual Binary Stars and Their Planetary Systems
Second Place: Camille Chiu | College Station High School | Predicting the Impact of Stellar Kinematics and Dynamics on Habitability in the Milky Way
Third Place: Aditya Panda | Plano West Senior High School | A Deep Learning Approach for Identification and Classification of Exoplanets

Junior Division

First Place: Erin Beall | Otto Middle School | Future of Rainbows Year 2
Second Place: Vivian Pina | Young Women’s Leadership Academy Middle School | Which Nut Contains the Most Energy?
Third Place: Ingrid Castro | Navasota Jr. High School | Impact Countdown

Robotics and Intelligent Machines

Senior Division

First Place: Leonardo De Farias | Southcrest Christian School High School | Using Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) Image Recognition to Program the Artificially Learned C3BO: Cancer Blood Oncologist
Second Place: Anysha Choudhuri | Franklin High School | Out of this World: 3D Printing Structures for Lunar Habitats
Third Place: Benjamin Gracia | Brownsville – Pace High School | Float My Boat – Submergible Robotic System Used to Clean Calm Bodies of Water

Junior Division

First Place: Eshaan Chachad | Rice Middle School | Transforming Colors to Assist People with Color Deuteranopia
Second Place: Arian Gutierrez | La Joya – Lorenzo De Zavala Middle School | Slow the Spread of COVID-19
Third Place: Aditya Lingam | Stiles Middle School | How Can Robots Help in Everyday Life?

Systems Software

Senior Division

First Place: Daniel Yamakov | Academy of Science and Technology | StockSy: A Stock Prediction and Analysis Toolkit Using Nonparametric Regression
Second Place: Yifan Guo | Texas Academy of Mathematics and Sciences High School | Symbiotic Neural and Graph-Based Question Answering
Third Place: Navya Ramakrishnan | Plano Senior High School | A Brain Computer Interface System for the Improvement of Cognitive and Communication Abilities for Patients with Neuromuscular Disorders

Junior Division

First Place: Ishika Kothari | Rice Middle School | I Spy To Classify; Enhancing A Visual Image Recognition Software to Classify Various Objects
Second Place: Raeleigh Stolle & Ariel Asare | China Spring Middle School | Utilizing Databases for Identification of Unknown Allergens via a Mobile App
Third Place: Ram Sivaraman | Canyon Vista Middle School | A New Method for Secure Password Generation Using Mel-Frequency Cepstral Coefficients