Utah Pollution Project Wins Intel Science Prize

By Deborah Zabarenko

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A polluted river in Utah inspired the top award winner on Tuesday of the Intel Science Talent Search, the competition for U.S. high school scientists sometimes billed as the junior Nobel prize.

Shannon Babb, 18, of Highland, Utah, won a $100,000 scholarship for her six-month study of water quality problems along the Spanish Fork River; she drew praise for her "rare ability to combine research and remediation in environmental science."

Babb, one of 40 finalists in the competition who gathered in Washington this week, said she planned to study watershed systems but ultimately hoped to get a law degree.

"I’d like to eventually get a doctorate in environmental law," she said in a telephone interview before the awards were announced. "It allows you to do consulting, so you’ll be able to help governments plan better laws to protect the environment."

The top prize is part of the $530,000 awarded to the student scientists by Intel Corp., the Silicon Valley firm that took over sponsorship of the science talent search program in 1998; the competition has been in place since 1942.

Yi Sun, 17, of San Jose, California, won second-place honors and a $75,000 scholarship; Yuan Zhang, 17, of Rockville, Maryland, took third place and a $50,000 scholarship.

Some finalists perceived a lack of funding for science, and others envisioned careers outside science. One finalist, Carmiel Schickler of Port Washington, New York, said he hoped to go into politics.

Intel’s Tracy Koon acknowledged that the climate for science might not be as hospitable as in some years, but stressed that science and mathematics education was essential to fuel U.S. technology, which in turn spurs productivity and prosperity.

"Without it, we decline, we wither, and somebody else takes our place," Koon said by telephone.

Koon’s remarks were in line with a 2005 National Academy of Sciences report that expressed deep concern "that the scientific and technological building blocks critical to our economic leadership are eroding at a time when many other nations are gathering strength."

President George W. Bush, who met with the science students this week, voiced similar concerns at his State of the Union address in January. He proposed doubling federal investment in basic research in the physical sciences in the next 10 years.