Three Indian Americans Among Top 10 Intel Contest Winners
Narendra Tallapragada, Preya Shah and Nilesh Tripuraneni are among the top 10 winners in the 2009 Intel Science Talent Search contest (the top prize went to Eric Larson). The 10 finalists were chosen from over 1600 participating high school seniors in 17 states.
Tallapragada, a 17-year-old from Burke, Virginia, won the fourth place for a project that simplifies complex models of atomic and molecular interactions. He hopes to design “mini-computers” that can perform delicate medical tasks, such as creating an automatic insulin pump inside a diabetic patient’s body. His scholarship is worth $25,000.
Shah, who received $20,000, is from Setauket, New York. Also 17 years old, she came in eighth. Shah developed and synthesized a tumor-targeting drug for cancer treatment that could possibly represent a new approach to delivery of chemotherapy agents and possibly treatment of cancer without causing major side effects. Coming in ninth was Tripuraneni, who received a $20,000 scholarship for formulating hydrodynamic equations that may help us understand the first movements of the universe and aid in the development of a quantum theory of gravity. This 18-year-old is from Fresno, California.
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