PRLHS students 'dominate' NIS&E fair

PRIEST RIVER — Of the 88 students who participated in the North Idaho Science and Engineering fair this year, 33 were from Priest River Lamanna High School.

“We dominated,” science teacher Shannon Fraser told West Bonner County School District board members last week. “We were the only high school north of Post Falls, which was awesome.”

The North Idaho Science and Engineering Fair is one of three regional events the STEM Action Center hosts statewide each spring. These fairs offer students the opportunity to engage in original STEM research projects aligned with their interests and give them the opportunity to meet and learn with other motivated students in their area.

The winning teams from each region earn all-expense-paid trips to attend and compete in the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair in Pittsburgh May 13-18.

Fraser said although they didn’t take first place in order to go the International Fair, four groups of PRLHS students won multiple prizes.

Since it was their first year participating in NISEF, Fraser said there were some regulation things she learned, such as visible tape on the posters — knowledge that will come in handy next time.

“The research that our kids did in about two and a half weeks of school time, other kids had two years … and we were competing and doing amazingly well,” Fraser said.

In addition to the 33 PRLHS competitors, Fraser said several students went to observe for future projects. A lot of the observers were already brainstorming ideas for research they wanted to start on right away, she said.

While it was the first year PRLHS has attended NISEF, this is the second year of the school’s Science Day, which was held Tuesday evening, where the students competed against one another.

Many of the projects were in response to real-world issues, from tornado roofs and upgrading post hole drivers to be more efficient, to outdoor education and research on the proposed Newport silicon smelter.

Max Bombino, who took home a total of four awards from NISEF, described his project of a hydrogen converter for gas powered cars during Tuesday's event.

"What I have here is a DC power supply, hooked up to about two feet of PVC pipe with two pieces of aluminum," Bombino explained. "The two pieces of aluminum are plugged into the DC power supply. I am using approximately three volts and 12 amps to basically tear water apart. Inside of the tube I also have water and potassium hydroxide. The potassium hydroxide is there to allow the electricity to flow through the water easier, and the only thing coming out of this tube is hydrogen gas and oxygen."

What he wants to do with the unit, he said, is take a small block of aluminum or steel, mill it out to create a carburetor and attach it to a gas powered car, eliminating the process of burning gas and, instead, burning hydrogen and oxygen. The emissions would essentially be hydrogen, oxygen and water vapor, Bombino said.

Other students looked at lowering power costs, such as Graden Hanes' idea to generate power while pumping iron, a theory he calls "Power Lift." The idea is that the weights are connected to a pulley, which creates energy and is connected to the home. The machine could go in schools as well, because school districts pay more than $6 billion a year for energy costs. He is building a model in welding class as well, though it wasn't ready in time for the Science Day event.

"This experience gets you stronger and gives your home power," Hanes explained. "We wanted to make it so you don't have wires running throughout your house. This machine can help out people who can't pay bills."

Brendan Reeves, Gary Warren, and Devin Needs also focused on power generation with a water wheel. It could be used for houses along creeks, they said, that can set up their own water wheel, cutting costs of electricity. They had a working model connected to a multimeter to show the electricity it was generating. The trio also took home awards from NISEF for their project.

The specialty awards PRLHS students brought home from NISEF include:

- From the American Meteorological Society for excellence in atmospheric or related sciences: Juli Babak and Kymara Fulton

- From the NASA for the NASA Earth System Science Award: Juli Babak and Kymara Fulton

- From the Association for Women Geoscientists for the student awards for geosciences excellence: Juli Babak and Kymara Fulton

- From Intel Excellence in Computer Science Award for the outstanding achievement in the category of computer science: Terry Janssen

- From SIWI’s Stockholm Junior Water Prize for the regional water prize award for water-related science research project: Brendan Reeves, Gary Warren, and Devin Needs

- From Ricoh USA, Inc. for the Ricoh Sustainable Development Award: Brendan Reeves, Gary Warren, and Devin Needs

- From the Office of Naval Research for the Naval Science Award: Max Bombino

- From the United States Air Force for an Outstanding Science and Engineering Fair Project: Max Bombino

- From the Arizona State University Walton Sustainability Solutions Award for the creation, design, and development of innovative solutions that directly address our planet’s sustainability: Max Bombino

- From the Northern Idaho Science and Engineering Fair for the Silver Medal in the category of Engineering, Math, and Computer Science: Max Bombino

Mary Malone can be reached by email at mmalone@bonnercountydailybee.com and follow her on Twitter @MaryDailyBee.