Student Curiosity, Ingenuity Put to the Test

What do you get when you mix a curious 13-year-old who’s a car buff, a mom with a strong desire for a hybrid car and the 55th annual Los Angeles County Science Fair?

You get Robert McRae, whose solar-powered go-cart was the talk of the fair this year. His design won second place in the junior division engineering category Friday.

With the casual, distracted air of a teenager, the eighth-grader donned a scuffed black helmet and took the stripped-down go-cart for a spin several times Friday to satisfy curious onlookers.

Robert, who attends St. Paul the Apostle School in west Los Angeles, built the solar-powered vehicle from a go-cart he received for Christmas several years ago.

His was one of more than 700 projects exhibited at the Los Angeles Convention Center this week. About 1,200 middle and high school students from 150 public and private schools studied an array of scientific topics, from the behavioral and social sciences to engineering, ecology and microbiology. They competed for medals, scholarships and cash prizes.

Students taking top honors will continue on to the California Science Fair in May.

Other student projects included Viewpoint High School senior Evan Gates’ Rubik’s cube-solving robot, which won the sweepstakes prize, and a project called Egg-Citing Osmosis that studied how much corn-syrup solution diffuses through shells of eggs.

This was Swati Yanamadala’s third year in the fair. She placed first in the senior division of the ecology category this year. Her research found that the Ballona Wetlands could be a source of fecal contamination to beaches on Santa Monica Bay. “It’s a really important human health concern,” said the 14-year-old, who is in the ninth grade at Chadwick School in Palos Verdes.

Swati spent several 12-hour days from November to January collecting samples every half an hour from the wetlands. Then she took the samples to a lab at nearby Loyola Marymount University, where she spent another three hours testing for bacteria levels.

Swati said she didn’t mind the long hours spent alone in the field or stuck in a lab while other teens were out having fun.

“I never doubt my reasons for being down there or think I’d rather be somewhere else,” she said. “It’s where I want to be.”

The environment has been a passion of hers since a science teacher sparked her interest in the seventh grade, she said.

That kind of passion is exactly what the nonprofit science fair wants to nurture, said Dean Gilbert, the fair’s director and a science curriculum consultant for the Los Angeles County Office of Education.

“Activities like this encourage kids to take their natural ability to question and solve problems,” Gilbert said. “These are our future scientists and engineers.”

Swati and Robert say their interest in science will not wane. Swati isn’t sure what she plans to study in college, but knows that she will remain in the sciences. Robert says he wants to do something in the area of building and designing cars in the future.

To make his solar-powered go-cart, Robert first removed its fiberglass body to make room for the solar panels. That left just the plain black frame.

He then replaced its gas-powered motor with a donated 1,200-rpm electric motor and two 12-volt batteries. Solar panels mounted on the front and back absorb energy from the sun and direct it to the motor, powering the car, Robert said.

“The motor uses the solar energy as it comes in,” he explained. “It saves the batteries and helps [them] last longer.”

Robert tested the solar-powered go-cart, which he built over a two-month period, in an empty Torrance parking lot in several 2 1/2 - to 3-hour test drives. He found the car traveled 22% farther and spent 17% more time on the road with solar panels than without.

His mother, Bobbi McRae, said Robert worked hard, never got flustered and took any problems in stride.

“He loves taking apart things,” she said. “Everything in the house is a potential tool for another project.”