Corona del Mar High School Biology Students Place Third in Nationwide Biomimicry Design Challenge

Left to right, top to bottom:Madison Yee,Aiden Walsh,Cyrus Ordoubadian,Heather Kroeger,Cameron Harty,Sebastian Demarais,Dylan Dyer, andNadia Khazei. Corona del Mar High School (CdMHS) Honors Biology students won third place in the nationwide for the BayProtector design. This year more than 6,000 students participated in the challenge across the US, and despite the transition to Distance Learning, 60 projects were submitted to the competition. This is the third year of the YDC, which is managed by the Biomimicry Institute. The YDC is a project-based learning program that partners with educators to provide students with real-world experiences in collaborating in teams to solve sustainability problems with nature as their guide. This year, students were tasked with using one of the sustainable development goals as their problem and devise a solution by imitating models, systems, and elements of nature to solve these complex human problems. The 9th-grade team from CdMHS included Cyrus Ordoubadian, Cameron Harty, Nadia Khazei, Madison Yee, Dylan Dyer, Aiden Walsh, Sebastian Demarais, and Daniel Liang. The winning team design, the BayProtector, focuses on how to improve water quality through the process of removing excess nitrogen from stormwater caused by nutrient pollution, by mimicking the structure of the small intestine. After the team looked at villi, small structures found in the lining of the small intestine, which assists with nutrient absorption; the team recognized the small intestine’s high surface area and curved shape as inspiration to further improve the design. As a class, students decided which group design to submit for the national YDC competition. Through class dialogue and analysis, limitations and constraints were identified in the BayProtector and the design was eventually developed. Some examples of the other team designs included looking at how insects collect water to help with water supply, improving light sources based on fireflies, and using the ability of ants to reflect light to build more sustainable, climate-controlled buildings. The YDC judges were pleased that the team incorporated testing results and feedback into their design process and understood the multiple strategies of their biological model, which made it successful. “I am extremely proud of my students for their hard work and innovation!” said Heather Kroeger, CdMHS teacher. “I have no doubt that they will continue to do great things and make the world a better place,” she said. The team plans to continue developing the idea with the goal of real-life implementation in the future.
Source: CDM High School New