An Indian-origin 9th grader in Georgia, USA, won the ‘Top Young Scientist’ competition for his design which detects pesticide residues on farm produce.

Sirish Subash, a student at Gwinnett School of Mathematics, Science, and Technology in Georgia’s Snellville, was named winner of the ‘2024 Young Scientist Challenge’.

US firms 3M and Discovery Education organise this competition every year, which is deemed to be the USA’s premier middle school science competition.

Subash designed an AI handheld pesticide detector, for which he won the prize of $25,000 (₹21.10 lakh), and the prestigious title of “America’s Top Young Scientist.”

Subash competed against nine other finalists and secured his win during the final events, which took place in Minnesota on October 14 and 15.

Subash was paired with Aditya Banerji, a senior research engineer at the company, who mentored and worked with him one-on-one over the summer to transform their idea from concept to prototype.

A statement published by an official release mentions that all the finalists navigated through a series of challenges. They were evaluated on their ingenuity and innovative thinking, application of STEM principles, demonstration of passion and research, presentation skills, and ability to inspire others.

AI-based pesticide detector developed by young scientist

Subash’s project, PestiSCAND, is a handheld device designed to detect pesticide residues on produce using a non-destructive method.

It employs spectrophotometry, which measures how light of various wavelengths is reflected off the surface of fruits and vegetables.

A machine learning model then analyses this data to determine the presence of pesticides.

PestiSCAND, consisting of various electronics, including a sensor, a power supply, a display screen, and a processor, achieved an accuracy rate of greater than 85% in identifying pesticide residues on spinach and tomatoes.