Studies of Prions and West Nile Virus Earn Top Awards
in Siemens Westinghouse Competition

The Schneider Brothers

For their efforts to model the spread of West Nile Virus, two teen-aged brothers from Connecticut earned the top team award in the prestigious Siemens Westinghouse Competition in Math, Science & Technology.

Jeffrey and Mark Schneider of South Windsor High School, ages 16 and 18, respectively, were named to receive a $100,000 scholarship check during a press briefing at AAAS, within the William T. Golden Center for Science & Engineering.

"Wow! We had never anticipated this. It's one of the most wonderful experiences of our lives!" Mark Schneider said, standing beside his brother in the AAAS Auditorium, after learning that their study placed first among team entries.

The competition's top individual award of $100,000 was bestowed upon Yin Li of Stuyvesant High School in New York City, for his study of prion proteins in the brain. A senior who is fluent in Chinese, Li hopes to become a neurologist. He investigated prion proteins' ability to undergo heritable and self-propagating changes in shape—mechanisms believed to underlie various neurodegenerative diseases. "This is very surprising because I just thought all the projects were so extraordinary," Li said, adding emotional words of thanks for his mentor, parents and others.

The Siemens Westinghouse Competition promotes excellence in science, mathematics and technology education in American high schools by awarding scholarships to outstanding young people. In Spring 1999, Siemens Foundation selected AAAS as the venue for the national competition, recognizing common goals to promote science education and diversity, explained Peter von Siemens, who traveled from Germany with his wife, Bettina Siemens to participate in the awards event.

"As I look in front of me, I see the future in its most inspired form," von Siemens told students at the AAAS event. "You have demonstrated through your energy and enthusiasm that there are rarely any finites."

Von Siemens closed his remarks by quoting the late American writer, Mark Twain: "Always do right. This will gratify some and astonish the rest."

Joining Siemens Foundation Chairman and CEO Albert Hoser; SF Executive Vice President Herb Carter; and other officials; AAAS CEO Alan I. Leshner, executive publisher of Science, congratulated the winning students: "What you're doing is essential not only to your own careers, but to the future of our society and to the future of our world," Leshner said.

The winning teens will be interviewed by reporters at CNN and other media outlets. They also have been invited to ring the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange on 9 December.

A prominent panel of judges, headed by Dr. Kathie L. Olsen, Associate Director, Office of Science and Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President, and the former Chief Scientist at NASA, evaluated national finalists as part of the competition.

Winning individual and team entries in this year's competition were as follows:

INDIVIDUAL COMPETITORS

Yin Li, Stuyvesant High School, New York, NY
"Characterizing the Prion Properties of a Translational Regulator Expressed in Mouse Brain"
$100,000 scholarship

Arun P. Thottumkara, Macomb High School, Macomb, IL
"Synthesis and Oxidative Transformations Using Novel Water-Soluble Hypervalent Iodine Reagents"
$50,000 scholarship

Linda Westrick, Maggie Walker Governor's School, Richmond, VA
"Investigations of the Number Derivative"
$40,000 scholarship

Herbert Mason Hedberg, North Attleboro High School, North Attleboro, MA
"An Efficient, Functional Telomerase Activity Assay"
$30,000 scholarship

Arpan Satsangi, Health Careers High School, San Antonio, TX
"Optimiation of Biomimetic Osteoblast Response on Phospholipid-Modified Implant Surface for Bone Regeneration"
$20,000 scholarship

Angela Shih, Troy High School, Fullerton, CA
"Theoretical Mechanisms and Kinetics for the Reaction of Dimethyl Sulfide and Ozone in Water Vapor"
$10,000 scholarship

TEAM COMPETITORS

Jeffrey Schneider and Mark Schneider, South Windsor High School, South Windsor, CT
"Simulation of the West Nile Virus using STELLA 7.02"
$100,000 scholarship

Sean K. Mehra and Jeffrey Reitman, Jericho High School, Jericho, NY
"Using Nanoparticles to Enhance the Polymer Properties for Improved Commercial Applications: Space Lubricants to Nanolithography"
$50,000 scholarship

Andrew C. Foster and Ivana Vu, North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics, Durham, NC
"Discovery of an Active Galaxy Near 3C397"
$40,000 scholarship

Jason P. Becker, Wellington C. Mepham High School, North Bellmore, NY; and Ishan Roy, Herbert Henry Dow High School, Midland, MI
"Synthesis, Deuterium Replacement, and Hydrogenation of the Compound HN(CH₂CH₂NHCOPh)₂"
$30,000 scholarship

Laurel Benson and Alexander K. Yuen, Appleton East High School, Appleton, WI
"Somatic Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated transformation assays in Zea Mays (maize) for optimization of in planta transformation"
$20,000 scholarship

Araceli Fernandez, Harlandale Sr. High School, San Antonio, TX; Yiduo "David" Want, Lincoln High School, Portland, OR; and Hannah Chung, Lyndon B. Johnson High School, Auistin, TX
"Eccentric Graphs of Block Graphs and Trees"
$10,000 scholarship

For more information on the Siemens Foundation, see www.siemens-foundation.org.

—Ginger Pinholster

8 December 2003