Maximilian Du, a rising junior at Fayetteville-Manlius High School, took home three special awards in an international science fair competition at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) held May 13 through 18 in Pittsburgh, Pa.
Du caught the attention of judges during competition with his project, “Non-Invasive Detection of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) Through Recurrent Neural Networks,” earning him international awards from the IEEE Foundation, International Council on Systems Engineering – INCOSE, and SAMVID Education Foundation.
“We are so proud of the impact of Max’s studies and research,” said Dr. Peter Plumley, MOST (Milton J. Rubenstein Museum of Science & Technology) chief program officer. “He is one of an elite group of ISEF winners, and we are humbled that Max is a CNYSEF participant.”
The Milton J. Rubenstein Museum of Science & Technology (MOST) annually hosts the Central New York Science & Engineering Fair (CNYSEF), a qualifying regional science fair for students to compete for the opportunity to enter rigorous international competition — where students from over 75 countries, regions and territories are represented. The MOST’s CNYSEF welcomes students from Central New York’s 10-county region with scholarship awards totaling upwards of $200,000 each year.
Maximilian Du has participated in CNYSEF since 2015 as a seventh grader, where he earned a perfect score and won a major merit award and grand prize award before winning the first place Science Award at Broadcom MASTERS, the premier science and engineering competition for middle school students.
Following his 2015 debut, Du earned a perfect score in 2016 at CNYSEF for a second year in a row before moving on to compete in Broadcom MASTERS, and in 2017 he placed among the top six CNYSEF participants before advancing to competition at the New York State Science Congress.
To enter international competition, students in grades nine through 12, or equivalent, must compete in an Intel ISEF affiliated science fair around the world, such as CNYSEF, and win the right to attend the Intel ISEF. Each affiliated fair sends a pre-determined number of projects to Intel ISEF (as factored by participation and high school population) to compete in 22 different categories.
This year marked the MOST’s 39th annual CNYSEF.
The event is hosted at SRC Arena on the campus of Onondaga Community College on the last Sunday in March.
“We encourage every student to participate in the MOST’s CNY Science & Engineering Fair,” said Plumley. “Whether your goal is to investigate a scientific topic of interest just for fun or you wish to compete at the international level, there is no better venue to showcase and share your work with the scientific community.”
