Vietnam wins two ASEAN young science talent awards

The 9th Southeast Asian Young Science Talent Search (SSYS) with the theme "Disaster Risk Reduction for Sustainable Development" took place in Penang, Malaysia, from March 3-7, 2014.

Students during practice. (Illustration photo: Minh Quyet/VNA)

Coming to SSYS 2014, the Vietnamese student delegation competed with two research topics and both topics won prizes, including second prize in Mathematics and third prize in Science.

Two students, Le Ngoc Thu Thao and Ngo Quang Thai from the Experimental Secondary School (Hanoi) won second prize with their Math project "Creating a forecast schedule for storms and tropical depressions in the Northern and Central provinces."

Using statistical and probabilistic research methods based on data on storms and tropical depressions that hit the North and Central of Vietnam from 2004 to 2013, the study has made some predictions about the danger level of each month according to the probability of being hit by a storm. A danger warning table is also provided with different storm exposure levels between months and provinces.

According to Mr. Do Duc Lan, an instructor at the Vietnam Institute of Educational Sciences, the research results have important implications for educational activities and school organization, thereby promoting to students as well as in schools to have a good plan to minimize the risk of storms and tropical depressions.

Third prize in the Science category went to Mai Dieu Quynh and Nguyen Hoang Tung (Viet Duc High School, Hanoi). With the project "Research on laccase enzyme for sustainable development applications," at the competition, the students presented their research on laccase enzyme secreted from fungi isolated from national forests and rotten straw in Hung Yen province.

Laccase enzyme is significant in treating many types of pollution, specifically pretreatment of agricultural by-products, and treatment of dye wastewater color, thereby supporting the construction of a sustainable economic development.

The Southeast Asian Young Science Talent Search Competition is held every two years since 1997. The competition aims to bring together young scientific talents from the ASEAN region to share and disseminate information about their science and mathematics projects as well as promote the development of scientific research among secondary school students.

The 9th SSYS had 40 projects from students from 9 ASEAN member countries, except Myanmar./.

According to Vietnam+