Children are treated with caution. They are prone to mood swings, love to attract attention and wear strange clothes. Most often, it remains to accept them as they are. But some teens break the mold. A new generation of young people is solving the problems of the modern world using advanced technologies.
Below we will talk about four teenagers who are changing the world.
Keiana Kave, 18, New Orleans
Kaveh's journey into the world of invention began with the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill. This spill created the largest oil slick at sea in human history. Then 4.9 million barrels (780,000 cubic meters) of oil got into the water in one of the most ecologically important reservoirs on the planet.
Immediately thereafter, dolphin children began to die six times more often, and fishermen and scientists reported "frightening numbers" of deformed sea creatures, shrimp without eyes, and fish with ulcers and holes.
Watching the news on TV, Kaveh immediately decided that this was just the tip of the iceberg of hidden environmental damage. She decided to find out what really happened.
Promotional video:
At fifteen, the girl began to study what happens to oil when it hits the surface of the ocean, and discovered that it forms chemical carcinogens under the influence of ultraviolet rays from the sun.
Today her work has grown to two scientific papers and two patents for chemical methods for the detection of carcinogens. She also launched a startup called Mare, which is working to disperse carcinogens while reducing their damaging effects. Her research has raised over a million dollars in funding.
Rifat Shaaruk, 18 years old, India
When Shaaruk was still a child, he spent long hours gazing into a telescope lens with his father. Sadly, Mohamed Farouk, a professor and scientist, passed away when his son was still in high school.
But love for space was passed along with DNA. At an early age, he joined the Space Children of India, which fosters a love of technology in young people. He formed a team of six people, whose goal for the next four years was to create a satellite under the leadership of the founder and director of the organization.
Every night teenagers discuss their plans via video link, ending almost in the morning. This is how KalamSat was born: the lightest satellite in the world.
It weighs only 64 grams, slightly larger than a battery. Basically, it is a 3-inch cube made of 3D-printed plastic, reinforced with carbon fibers. It contains several different types of sensors, including sensors for measuring temperature, magnetism, altitude, and the material that settles on a structure as it flies through space. Also, the satellite has its own power source and a small computer that allows you to turn on all the sensors at the right time and store data from them.
The plan was to suborbit KalamSat and test the behavior of the reinforced plastic in microgravity. Lightweight materials that can withstand the hardships of space travel are extremely useful, as the cost of sending 450 grams into space costs about $ 10,000. Upon reaching the destination, the satellite will collect data for 12 minutes, after which it will fall back to Earth, into the ocean.
On June 22, 2017, the device was successfully launched from the NASA site in Walls Island, Virginia.
Hannah Herbst, 18, Florida
Herbst began inventing at the age of 15, communicating with a then nine-year-old boy from Ethiopia who did not have access to light. This shouldn't surprise you: 1.3 billion people in the world live without electricity. Herbst came up with the idea for the Beacon (Bringing Electricity Access to Countries through Ocean Energy), a device that captures energy directly from ocean waves.
Herbst's idea was that peoples tend to settle near bodies of water; about 40% of the world's population lives within 100 kilometers of the coast and only 10% lives further than 10 kilometers from a fresh water source that does not need to be dug, such as a river or lake.
The technology is a hollow plastic tube with a propeller at one end and a hydroelectric generator at the other. When the tidal energy spins the propeller, it is converted into usable energy in the generator. After developing a turbine prototype as a computer model, Herbst printed a 3D prototype that was tested on the coast.
Scaling up the design, Herbst calculates that the Beacon should charge three car batteries simultaneously in one hour. This energy will be enough to power water treatment technologies or blood vessels in hospitals in developing countries.
Herbst's invention has earned her many awards, and the girl is currently pursuing degrees in computer engineering while completing high school in parallel.
Julian Rios Cantu, 18, Mexico
This inventor was only 13 years old when his mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. He watched in horror as the tumor swelled in size from a grain of rice to a golf ball in just six months. As a result, the mother had both breasts removed, and thus the cancer was defeated.
After just a few years, Cantu decided to protect others from this disease. Together with three friends, he formed Higia Technologies, which develops wearable devices that can detect early signs of illness.
The prototype EVA outer bra is filled with sensors that can be attached to a regular bra and needs to be worn for one hour a week. The idea is to study changes in skin temperature and elasticity, two of the main signs of disease development. After each use, the data is sent to the company's app, and the AI algorithm calculates the risk for each person separately.
The device has already attracted little funding, but is still far from mass production. He will undergo clinical trials. In the past, similar technologies were deemed unreliable.
But if the project succeeds, it could save millions of lives. More than two million people are diagnosed with breast cancer a year, and a quarter of them die. For treatment to be successful, early detection of malignant processes is important.
Many inventors started early. TVs, telephones, trampolines, Braille, calculators, headphones and much more were invented by people before they turned 20. Any of these guys could be the next Thomas Edison or Elon Musk.
Based on materials from the BBC
Ilya Khel