The Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) is the world’s largest international pre-college science competition. Each year, ISEF brings over 1,800 high school students from 75 countries to exhibit and demonstrate ingenuity and innovation through science projects of their own design. For more information, visit https://www.societyforscience.org/isef/.
USAID presents the Science for Development Award to recognize innovative student projects in science and technology that could advance our ability to meet current and future development challenges. Student projects are recognized with first place ($5,000), second place ($3,000), and third place ($2,000) awards in four categories. For ten years, USAID has provided over $300,000 in awards. Additionally, USAID presents the Science Champion Award to exceptional students or teams exhibiting at ISEF-Affiliated Fairs around the world whose projects have the potential to make an impact on addressing international development challenges.
USAID’s Involvement in ISEF Fact Sheet
At the 2024 Regeneron ISEF, USAID presented the Science for Development Award to the following projects:
Global Health and Nutrition
1st Place: Faisal Isam Nabulsi & Michael Xu (USA) - SCOMAE: Diagnosing Tuberculosis from Cough Acoustics Using Supervised Contrastive Masked AutoEncoders
2nd Place: Siriarpha Panturaporn & Siripapha Panturaporn (Thailand) - Alternative Organic Sanitary Pads From Plant Fibers Enhanced with Gooseberry Extract Coating
3rd Place: Jackson Wilson (USA)- DengueScreen: A Novel Computer Vision-Based Diagnostic Alternative for Dengue Fever Prioritizing Efficiency, Cost-Effectiveness, and Accuracy
Education and Youth
1st Place: Abhishek Amit Shah (USA) - AuralStudio: A Multisensory Development Environment With a Novel, Bytecode-Compiled Programming Language
2nd Place: Maya Shah (USA) - Prevention of Gun Violence Through the Buffering Effects of Intellectual Humility in Traumatized Psychopaths
3rd Place: Nira Goyal (USA) - A Review of the Use and Promotability of Mental Health Apps by Teenagers
Climate and Environmental Protection
1st Place: Kshemaahna Nagi (India) - A New Cost-effective Adsorbent Device for Civic Remediation to Reduce Lead, Copper and Cadmium in Surface Water Runoff
2nd Place: Ruvarashe Moyo (Zimbabwe) - A Low Cost and High Performance Xylem-Activated Carbon Filter Water Purification Device: A Novel Approach to the Global Clean Water Crises
3rd Place: Haaris Masood & Haon Kim (Pakistan) - Leveraging Electrochemistry and Light Scattering to Improve Air Quality Detection
Working in Crisis and Conflict
1st Place: Sierra Anne Sun (USA) - Differential Empathy, Social Dominance Orientation, and the Limitations of Social Science Research
2nd Place: Burak Eren Demir, Muhammet Basar Ozcan & Salih Celik (Turkey) - Differential Empathy, Social Dominance Orientation, and the Limitations of Social Science Research
3rd Place: Meenakshi Nair (USA) - Urban Slum Detection and Mapping: Semantic Segmentation on VHR Satellite Imagery
Related Articles:
- Research in Action: Celebrating 10 years of science fair achievements
- Full Circle: 51 years after his own victory, USAID’s Robert Melville returns to the world’s preeminent science fair to represent...USAID
- Inspiring Stories of Young Scientists
- Young Scientists for Development
- Extra Credit
- At Intel ISEF 2019, 48 organizations Know That Young Scientists Are the Future
- USAID Provides Awards for First Time at Intel ISEF 2014
- Remarks by Administrator Rajiv Shah at the USAID Forward Progress Event
Past Winners
