Brilliant minds

Three Brewster High School students have taken top honors in the Science Horizons INTEL Fair, where 800 students from throughout New York and Connecticut competed.

Last week’s competition was held at Western Connecticut State University in Danbury and featured more than 700 unique projects.

Four students from Brewster competed, along with a dozen students from the Henry Wells Middle School who entered the junior competition.

Brewster’s young scholars—Carrie Kelley, Matt Rizzotti, Madeleine Skaller, and Julian Zuluaga—were all selected as finalists.

Julian’s project—Computer Modeling of Bulk Heterojunctions in Polymeric/ Fullerene Solar Cells—earned him a 4th place trophy and entrance to the Connecticut State Science Fair from a pool of 50 projects.

Matt’s project—A Study of Induced Cephapthalin Resistance in E coli— was awarded third place in the senior division and also earned him a slot in the state fair.

Madeleine’s project—Biomimetics: Investigations into the Novel Insulation Fabrication—won her the gold medal as the fair’s grand champion. Madeleine, who is a junior this year, was selected to represent the entire region at the Science Horizons INTEL National Fair in San Jose, California, in May.

Madeleine also received awards from the Departments of the Navy and Air Force, as well as a trip to the Connecticut State Fair.

Brewster High School science instructor Edward Schmidt congratulated the young scholars for a job well done: “Each of these students has a bright future. We are so proud of them.”

The middle school children also do remarkably well. Teddy Galgano and Michael Fitzgibbons were selected as finalists with their project that dealt with a novel approach to treating flesheating disease with spider bites. Kristian Unti and Brian Schanbacher also were finalists for their project dealing with the effect of water ozonation on captive fish health.

Out of more than 50 teams Kristian and Brian won the bronze medal for their efforts.