NAVS Humane Science Prizes Awarded at Illinois and International Fairs
Wednesday, May 19, 2010

NAVS salutes all of our 2010 winners at the IJAS and the Intel ISEF

Awards were presented to outstanding science students who participated in the Illinois Junior Academy of Science and the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair. We salute all of our 2010 winners.

Each year NAVS gives awards to students whose projects represent excellence in science and accomplish their purpose without invasive experimentation or reliance on an animal model.

*     *     *

The Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (Intel ISEF) held this year in San Jose, California, on May 11-13, showcased the talent of more than one thousand high school students from around the world. While there were a number of projects that involved invasive experiments—within a laboratory setting—a vast majority of the projects had little to do with animal research.

This year our prizes were awarded to students who fulfilled our award’s objectives with excellent projects in three different categories.

1st place:
Philip Schlenoff for his project, Antibody-Coated Magnetic Nanoparticles: Targeting and Treating Cancer in a Dynamic Environment.
This project, in the Medicine category, included the development of a device to mimic the vascular activity of a live organism in order to coat cells. This is intended to reduce the number of live animals that will be used for experimentation into the use of nanoparticles in cancer treatment.

2nd place: 
Vivian Leung for her cellular biology project, Morphological and Functional: Characteristics of Lower Female Genital Tract Epithelial Cell Cultures in Different Growth Conditions.
This project created a new in vitro model for growing cell cultures that more closely mimic the conditions within the body and will therefore produce more predictive results.

3rd place:
Athman Adiseshan for his project, Ethology of Friendship among Adult Male Bonnet Macaques (Macaca radiata) at Arunachala Hill, India.
This project epitomizes an effective observational study both in his observational techniques and for his thoughtful quantification of data resulting from the study.

*     *     *

The Illinois Junior Academy of Science Fair (IJAS), held in Champaign on May 8th, resulted in the awarding of projects to four students for their research that promotes science without harming animals.

The winners at the Illinois Junior Academy of Science fair are:

1st place
Qadija Qadri for her project, EphB4 Amplification: Effect on Tumor Proteins.

2nd place
Jonathan Loucks, for his project, Predicting Secondary Protein Structure: An Analysis of Ab initio and Homology Based Modeling.

3rd place (tie)
Robin David for her project, p53 as a Prognostic Tool in Determining the Aggressiveness of Cancer.

Julia Lechowicz for her project, Analysis of Human Remains As a Key to Understanding Osteoporoses Yesterday & Today.

Congratulations to all of our winners this year.