Synge Street Leaving Cert Students Eric Doyle and Mark Kelly Announced as Winners of the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition 2012

The winner of the 48th annual BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition 2012 has been announced! Leaving Cert students Eric Doyle and Mark Kelly, both aged 17, from Synge Street CBS, Dublin 8 have taken home the top prize for their project entitled, “Simulation accuracy in the gravitational many-body problem”. The announcement was made at the BT Arena at Dublin’s RDS this evening, by Minister for Education and Skills Ruairi Quinn, TD, along with Colm O’Neill, CEO, BT Ireland.  Eric and Mark were entered in the Chemical, Physical & Mathematical Sciences category, senior section.

Eric & Mark were presented with a cheque for €5,000, tickets to the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, the opportunity to represent Ireland at the 24th European Union Young Scientist competition taking place in Bratislava in September and a Waterford crystal trophy.  
Almost 1,200 students from 30 counties covering 550 projects from 221 schools nationwide competed for the coveted title ‘Winner of the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition 2012.’

Colm O’Neill, CEO, BT Ireland said, “The passion and enthusiasm we have seen from the students taking part this week has been outstanding. This year’s exhibition was bigger and better than ever before and the reaction from the students, teachers and visitors to the RDS this week has been amazing. We live in a continually changing world and what we have seen from the students this week is that they have the foresight and innovation to come up with real problem solving ideas that can help Ireland to grow and develop into the future. Huge congratulations to Eric & Mark and all the winners. I look forward to watching their progress in the coming years,” he added.

Professor Pat Guiry, Head Judge, Chemical, Physical & Mathematical category said, “The project develops a novel mathematical approach which has a diverse range of applications from satellite placement to predicting network congestion in telecommunications.  In the opinion of the judging panel, an exceptional level of mathematical proficiency was demonstrated. Starting from Euler’s investigation in 1760 on the motion of planets, they simulated this complicated “many-body” problem using advanced computation and evaluated the accuracy of the solutions. Of particular note, they included an in-built accuracy estimation in their solution.”
Further awards presented tonight included Best Individual which went to Eoin Farrell from St Eunan’s College, Donegal for his project entitled “Paediatric resuscitation: How reliable are existing weight estimation methods in Ireland”.

The award for individual runner-up went to Aoife Gregg, from Loreto College, St Stephens Green, Dublin, for her project entitled “Cryptography: A study of the Irish language” entered in the Chemical, Physical & Mathematical Sciences category, intermediate section.

The award for group runner-up went to Deirdre Harford & Colleen Kelly from Loreto Secondary School, Balbriggan for their project entitled “A search for genes associated with drought resistance in potatoes” entered in the Biological & Ecological Sciences category, senior section.

Almost 40,000 people are expected to have passed through the doors of the RDS during the week which continues tomorrow Saturday, 14th January 2012. Doors are open from 9.30am to 5pm.

For more information on the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition please visit www.btyoungscientist.com or twitter.com/btyste