GHS Science Students Earn Top Honors at CT Science Fair

Congratulations are in order for a group of 10 juniors and a seventh-grader from who brought home a wealth of awards and honors from this past weekend’s 63rd annual Connecticut Science Fair.

It was pretty heady competition at the fair that drew nearly 500 students from around the state who presented their research projects at in Hamden.

The projects created by three of the students were selected to proceed to national competitions later this spring.

Ryota Ishizuka of Cos Cob, a junior at Greenwich High School, is the top winner of the fair’s Physical Sciences category. In a project, called Optimization of a Microbial Fuel Cell Structure to Drive a Bioelectrochemically-Assisted Wastewater Treatment Reactor, Ishizuka researched ways to use electricity to maximize the output and cost efficiency of microbial fuel cells in converting sewage wastewater into energy while simultaneously neutralizing the organic materials in the wastewater.

• Charlotte D’Acierno of Old Greenwich, won for her project: Subsistence of Escherichia Coli on Artificial Turf Surfaces which includes a $20,000 four-year scholarship at Quinniapiac College.
• Representing Connecticut at the Stockholm Junior Water Prize U.S. national competition will be Will B. Hallisey, with his project Electrified Nanoscale Architecture in Mixed Matrix Membranes as a Means of Rapid Throughput Water Sterilization
• Also winning medals for their work were Carl O. Akerman, Philip W. Geske, Connor M. Harris, Victoria R. Leto, Thomas C. Newberry, James P. O'Sullivan and Nicholas M. Ornitz. Representing Eastern Middle School was seventh-grader Paul J. Hansel.

Five top winners from the CSF will represent the state and vie for more than $5 million in cash and scholarships at the 2011 Intel International Science & Engineering Fair, the world’s largest pre-college science fair, being held May 8-13 in Los Angeles, and the International Sustainable World Energy, Engineering & Environment Project Olympiad (I-SWEEEP), May 4-9 in Houston, Texas.  This year, for the first time, several top winners will receive an expense-paid trip to compete in the GENIUS Olympiad, a new international science competition focusing on global environmental issues that will be held at the State University of New York in Oswego, New York, June 26-30.

In addition, several CSF high school projects, either team or individual, will be selected to represent Connecticut at the Stockholm Junior Water Prize (SJWP) U.S. National Competition in Chicago, June 23-25. The top four middle school winners will receive invitations to submit their work to compete in the nationwide Broadcom MASTERS (Math, Applied Science, Technology and Engineering for Rising Stars) Competition, a program of Society for Science & the Public.

***

Kudos to members of the Greenwich High School Former Attire Club who are continuing a nine-year-old tradition.

They are looking for donations of gently used dresses and gowns suitable for resale for prom wear. The club collects dresses – short and long – for resale to Greenwich girls. They then donate the proceeds to Stamford nonprofit .

This year’s annual dress sale – which also will include jewelry and accessories - is set for Wednesday, April 27 and Thursday, April 28, from 6 to 9 p.m., at the , 49 River Road, Cos Cob.

To donate make a donation, call Chelsea Oarr at (203) 661-4721 or Lauren Allen at (203) 618-9755 to arrange for a club member to collect the donation.

Former Attire also accepts menswear suitable for job interviews, as well as street clothes, bedding and towels that members donate to Pacific House emergency men’s shelter in Stamford.

***

Area residents earning academic honors

has announced the Dean's List for the fall 2010 semester includes:

• Sean Bannon, of Greenwich, a senior studying in the Dolan School of Business;
• Charles Johnson, of Greenwich, a junior studying in the College of Arts and Sciences, and
• Dung Le, of Greenwich, a senior studying in the School of Engineering.

Local students earning honors for the winter term at The Loomis Chaffee School include sophomore Theodora Cohen of Greenwich, senior Margaret Lefton of Greenwich, and freshman Amanda Weinstein of Greenwich.