Four Aurora Students Recognized in National Science Contest

On Wednesday, the Society for Science and the Public announced the top 300 student science projects in their high school science talent search. Four of the students were from Aurora.

Three students from the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy were recognized for their research projects:

• Pranav Sivakumar for "Searches for Almost Dark Galaxies in Blank Sky Fields with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey" (a new way to look at information from a digital telescope)
• Pranav Aadithya Upadhyayula for "Rethinking Depression Treatment: A Study on the Intra-Subject Variability in Resting-State fMRI and the Development of a Novel Computational Tool to Improve Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation for Major Depressive Disorder Treatment" (a project on the use of electromagnets to treat depression)
• Neha Verma for "Innervation of Pathway-specific Striatal Spiny Projection Neurons by Npas1+ Neurons of the External Globus Pallidus" (a project on nerve cells)

Rajath Dinesh Salegame from Waubonsie Valley High School was recognized for his project, "ROS-mediated Oxidative Stress Induces a-tubulin Detyrosination in Osteosarcoma and tsA201 Cells" (a project on bone cancer cells)

Each student will be awarded $2,000 and their school will get $2,000 for each winner. The contest is sponsored by Regeneron, a pharmaceutical company that had $4.1 billion in revenues in 2015.

The top 40 students recognized in the contest will be announced on January 24.

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