Innovative projects from Navan bright sparks at RDS

Projects from two Meath secondary schools have won prizes in their categories at the annual BT Young Scientist Competition at the RDS last week. Alice Brennan and Grace Collender from Loreto St Michael's Secondary School, Navan, finished second in the intermediate section of the Biological and Ecological Sciences category, while St Patrick's Classical School, Navan, students Ciaran O'Rourke and Hugh Martyn finished in third place in the senior section of the same category. This year, nine projects from six Meath schools were selected from more than 1,735 entries to be among the 500 projects that went on display at the exhibition. The six local schools taking part included St Pat's, Navan; St Michael's, Navan; St Peter's College, Dunboyne; St Joseph's Secondary School, Navan; Ratoath College and Beaufort College, Navan. WATER IMMERSION Transition year students Alice Brennan and Grace Collender from Loreto finished in second place in their category for their project which investigated whether water immersion enhances the blood pressure-lowering effects of exercise and if hypertension can be prevented. Alice explained that they came up with the idea for their project after a friend of theirs was diagnosed with hypertension and high blood pressure, despite being only their age. “She had to be put on drugs and was very disappointed as she is only our age and, once you go on drugs for blood pressure, you are usually on them for life. “She was very young to be dependent on drugs so we thought there must be some way to reduce blood pressure without drugs,†she said. The St Michael's student added that they knew exercise lowers blood pressure and that immersion in water can also reduce it, so they decided to combine these two factors and investigate if exercising in water is more effective in lowering blood pressure than exercise out of water. Alice explained that they first got ethical approval from Beaumont Hospital because they were carrying out their study on people and asked for volunteers in their class and got parental approval as the girls were under 18. They got 22 volunteeers and intended to carry out the project over four weeks but the snow in December meant they had to cut it short to just two weeks. They took the girls' blood pressure without exercise in the morning and evening during the first five days and then took their blood pressure after they had done aerobics, and the following week after they had done aqua aerobics. Their results showed that the reduction in systolic blood pressure after aqua aerobics was twice as much as after ordinary aerobics and that the reduction after aqua aerobics was similar to the lowering effect of anti-hypertension drugs. In terms of the sustained effect of the exercise, Alice explained that they did not have a definitive answer as they had to cut back the length of the study due to the snow. “We were delighted to finish second in our category, it was a really big surprise,†said Alice. She said they had met lots of people and seen lots of different projects. Science teacher Helena Smyth she was thrilled for the girls and that they had put a lot of work into their project. BOOTS STUDY St pat's fifth year students Ciaran O'Rourke and Hugh Martyn also won an award at the exhibition after finishing third in the senior section of the Biological and Ecological Sciences Category. Ciaran explained that their project investigated the connection between rupturing the anterior cruciate ligament and the type of football boots worn by the player. They tested six types of football boots on four types of surface - average, soft ground, hard ground and astroturf. They strapped a Newton Spring Balance to the knee and another one to the goalpost and investigated the results with each type of boot, checking the inward rotational movement and how much each knee moved with each boot. Ciaran said their results found that moulded studs were the best type of stud on each ground type to reduce rupturing of the ligament. Both Ciaran and Hugh play Gaelic football and had noticed in their clubs that a lot of players were tearing their cruciates and wondered why it was happening. This was how they came to choose the subject for their project. He added that there was a huge crowd at the RDS on the Friday and Saturday and there was a lot of interest in their stand, including from the GAA. Both students are doing both physics and biology for their Leaving Cert and are really interested in science. Ciaran said they were delighted when their names were called out as winners. Their teacher, James McHugh, said: “Ciaran and Hugh put in a great effort and it was a credit to them to do so well when there were so many entries.†Mr McHugh said there were five projects entered from St Patrick's Classical School, conducted by second and fifth year students, which was the highest number of entrants from the schools in Meath. St Peter's, Dunboyne, students Susan Culhane and Amy McNamara exhibited a project in the junior section entitled 'Pretty Packaging' where they promoted healthy eating focusing on the type of packaging healthy food is packaged in. Niamh Fitzsimons, Moira Dineen and Francesca Kelly-Murray from St Joseph's Secondary School, Navan, exhibited a project in the junior section which investigated aggression and addiction levels caused by video games. Ratoath College student Eoghan Fagan's project, also in the junior section, was entitled '21st Century Dialann' and is an Apple application to help all students, including visually impaired students, plan their day, schedule classes and navigate around their school using GPS. Beaufort College in Navan was represented by Conan Comerford, Carl McHale and Tega Dortie in the junior section with their project, which studied the way temperature affects fingerprint quality.