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19 March 2018
Congratulations to Emily Xu and other GSA school students for their performance in The Big Bang UK Young Scientists and Engineers Competition.
Emily Xu, from James Allen’s Girls’ School, scooped top GSK UK Young Scientist of the Year 2018 title. Emily was awarded the prize for her project ‘New Ways Of Separating Mirror Image Molecules’ which looked at new methods of separating different types of molecules that can be very difficult to distinguish, as they are mirror images of each other. The process could be very helpful in the pharmaceutical industry; in the case of ibuprofen, it could help make it more effective, and in the case of thalidomide, it could have eliminated negative effects.
Mark Titterington, Chief Executive of EngineeringUK, which organises The Big Bang Competition, said:
“Emily stunned judges with the insight, creativity and hard work that went into their brilliant entry. This innovative project was an extremely impressive project that makes her a worthy winner of this year’s award. I’m hopeful that seeing what they’ve achieved will encourage young people across the UK to enter next year’s Competition. While it’s easy to see why this project was a hit with judges, I have been blown away by the quality of entries from all of our finalists – both in terms of the work that went into them and the way they showcased that work with such confidence at The Fair. It certainly bodes well for the future that the scientists, engineers and inventors of tomorrow are already producing such astute and creative project work.”
Emily said:
“I am very honoured to be given this award. The overall Big Bang experience is definitely one that I’d recommend to any other young person interested in pursuing science.”
Other GSA students who made it to the finals were:
- From The Ladies College, Guernsey Lauren Rebstein and Pia Thapliyal with their ‘Diabetic Orange Juice’ project and Katie Connolly and Daisy Whiteman for their ‘Guernsey Potato Power’ project.
- Students from Lady Eleanor Holles School working in a joint team with students from Hampton school (for boys) with their ‘How AI Can Help Everyone’ project. They were Jude Goodsell, Lakshmi Aggarwal, Charlotte Lewis, Lily Griffiths, Toby Gwynne and Tom del Rio.
- Kayla Kongsamran from More House School with her project ‘Can Making Paper our of Bananas Reduce Deforestation’.
- Alishba Khalid from Bedford Girls’ School and her project looking into Heart Disease Treatment.
- From The Mount School, York Beth Mottram with her ‘Space Saving Furniture’ project and Sophie Search with her ‘Riding Aid with Storage’ project for young people with autism.
- Jessica Allwright, Bianca Boren and Nina Fraser from Alderley Edge School for Girls – their project was a ‘Playground Clock and Traffic Light System’.
- From Loughborough High School – Netra Gupta and Ankitha Kunigiri and their project ‘Energy from Exercise’; Katie Handford, Antonia Buswell and Jayna Jobanputra with their ‘Conductor Vest’ project; and Meraam Ibrahim and Grace Johnston for their ‘SafeCase’ project.
The Big Bang Competition is an annual contest designed to recognise and reward young people’s achievements in all areas of science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM), as well as helping them build skills and confidence in project-based work.
A full list of finalists can be found here.
