Elspie Macpherson and Lara Kerr from Wimbledon High School
Submitted by Wimbledon High School
A team from Wimbledon High School in Wimbledon, London, is through to the national finals of the Amazon Longitude Explorer Prize - a nationwide tech-for-good prize that saw hundreds of young people aged 11-16 enter innovative ideas to solve the big challenges of our time.
The people of Wimbledon are being called upon to show their support and get behind the team by voting for them to win the prize's People’s Choice Award - the winner of which will receive £5,000 for its school or youth group - which you can do here.
Lara Kerr and Elspie Macpherson have made it to the final 40 with Bioclear, a spherical robot that operates in water, using infrared sensors to detect microplastics, binding them with special metallic fluid which allows it to remove the plastic using magnets attached to the back of the robot.
Lara Kerr said: “Our idea solves the growing problem of microplastics in oceans and other water bodies. Microplastics are a leading cause of death in marine wildlife and can be ingested by all organisms, from zooplankton, which is at the base of the food chain, to whales, turtles, and sea birds all with threatening consequences, including effects on growth and reproduction.
“Microplastics, also harmful for humans, are being consumed through food deemed fit for consumption. It's approximated that the average European sea-food eater consumes 11,000 plastic particles annually. It is urgently important to solve and rectify this problem.”
Elspie Macpherson added: “Our idea is for a robot that removes microplastics from water ecosystems and marine life. If microplastics have not been consumed by the bottom of the food chain, almost no microplastics occur in organisms higher up the food chain, including humans.
"Biobots are sandy-coloured, spherical robots about 30cm in diameter. They will detect microplastics through infrared sensors, trapping them as a ferrofluid (made with oil and magnetite) to magnets in the back of the biobot, whilst allowing purified water to escape through a manta net.”
The Amazon Longitude Explorer Prize, delivered by innovation foundation Nesta Challenges, supports participants to learn creatively about STEM (science, technology, engineering, and maths) whilst developing new entrepreneurial life-skills to turn their bright ideas into real-world solutions.
Responding to the news of the People's Choice Award, Lauren Kisser, director at Amazon’s development centre in Cambridge, and an Amazon Longitude Explorer Prize judge, said: “Selecting the final 40 teams for the Amazon Longitude Explorer was challenging enough for the judges. Now people have an even tougher choice in voting for their favourite.
“There has been some serious ingenuity and creativity on show - from ocean cleaning robots to an app that makes recycling easy, micro-turbines that generate electricity from your drainpipes and a phone case that sanitises your hands. These ideas have the potential to make a huge difference to our world and inspire additional future technologists.”
Tris Dyson, founder and managing director of innovation foundation, Nesta Challenges, which delivers the prize, said: “The Amazon Longitude Explorer Prize supports 11-16-year-olds to grow their bright ideas into real-world technologies that will have a positive social impact.
“The 40 teams of talented entrepreneurs have worked extraordinarily hard to create and develop their outstanding ideas in the face of very difficult circumstances this last year.
“The People’s Choice Award vote is an opportunity for the public to show its support for these inspiring tech-for-good innovations and the young people who have worked so hard to build them.”
The online vote runs until July 2. The public can find out all about the 40 finalist ideas on the Amazon Longitude Explorer Prize website and vote for their favourite in the online poll.