5 Indian Americans among 2018 Young Scientist Challenge finalists

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Out of the 10 Discovery Education 3M Young Scientist Challenge 2018 finalists, five are Indian Americans.

The Indian Americans are: Mehaa Amirthalingam, 13, of Sugar Land, Texas; Sriram Bhimaraju, 12, of Cupertino, California; Rishab Jain, 13, of Portland, Oregon; Cameron Sharma, 14, of Glen Allen, Virginia; and Krish Wadhwani, 14, of Alpharetta, Georgia.

Amirthalingam has developed a toilet flushing system that uses both fresh and recycled water to reduce water consumption in the home while Bhimaraju has developed Archery Assistant, an app that improves an archer’s accuracy by correcting form in real-time using a Bluetooth sensor, according to a press release.

Jain desires to make the treatment of pancreatic cancer more effective and has created a method that uses artificial intelligence to help accurately locate the pancreas during MRI radiotherapy.

Sharma has created a computer model that calculates the seasonal flu vaccine using artificial intelligence (AI) and deep machine learning to identify personalized flu vaccines.

Sharma wants to become a biomedical engineer and he is exceptionally gifted in mathematics, as last year, he earned a perfect 800 score on the math SAT and was offered a $160,000 college scholarship. He is also in the top 0.2 percent in the American Mathematics Association competition.

Wadhwani hopes to find a cure for Huntington’s disease — a hereditary, progressive brain disorder and his goal is to ultimately eliminate the disease through an injectable medication using Synthetic Antibody Mimics (SyAMs) to locate and attach to a specific protein found on the surface of cancer cells.

All ten finalists are afforded an opportunity to work one-on-one with a renowned 3M Scientist during a summer mentorship program.

Each student receives 1,000 dollars and an expense-paid trip to the 3M headquarters to participate in the final competition.

They will compete in the final event this fall for a grand prize of $25,000, the title of “America’s Top Young Scientist,” and an opportunity to attend the taping of a Discovery Network show.

The competition will be held on October 15 and 16, at the 3M Innovation Center in St. Paul, Minnesota.