Blair leads country in Intel finalists

The Science Service chose three Blair students as finalists in the 61st Intel Science Talent Search, giving Blair more finalists than any other school in the country.

Jenny Alyono, Jacob Burnim, Jean Li and 37 other students nationwide were selected from 300 semifinalists to be finalists in the prestigious Intel Science Talent Search, an annual competition that Blair traditionally does well in.

Senior Jenny Alyono, who is in Blair's Math/Science/Computer Science magnet, won for her engineering project, "Development of an Electrochemical Biosensor for Phospholipase C Based on Supported Hybrid Lipid Bilayer Membranes," which was aimed towards finding a simpler way to identify biological molecules crucial in several medical applications.

Magnet senior Jacob Burnim won for his engineering project, "On the Scaling of Electronic Charge-storing Memory Down to the Size of Molecules," which dealt with shrinking a computer's RAM down to the molecular level.

Magnet senior Jean Li won for her Earth and Space Sciences project, "Chemical Origins of Extraterrestrial Organic Macromolecules in Carbonaceous Chondritic Meteorites," which explored the origin of carbon compounds in meteorites.

The only other finalist in the DC metro area was Ophelia Venturelli, a senior at Walt Whitman High School. Her project, "Protective Role of Estrogen in the Ocular Lens: Implications for Postmenopausal Cataract," analyzed the growth patterns of certain types of cataracts in rats.

This year, 1592 students from 31 states, Washington, DC, and Guam entered the competition, which judges applicants on projects in the fields of science, engineering, mathematics and computer science. On January 16, representatives of the Science Service came to Blair to announce that Blair had more semifinalists than any other school in the country, with 17. They also announced 2 semifinalists from Walt Whitman High School.

The 40 finalists will compete for scholarships totaling $530,000, including a $100,000 grand prize, in Washington, DC from March 6 to 11. A Blair student won the grand prize in 1996, and then-senior Alan Dunn placed fourth overall in last year's competition for his computer security project.