Dunbar Junior Wins International Science Fair

Grace Sun, a junior at Paul Laurence Dunbar High School, earned the top prize in the 2024 Regeneron International Science & Engineering Fair (ISEF), which drew nearly 2,000 students from all over the world. Capping this year’s competition in Los Angeles, Regeneron and Society for Science presented Grace the $75,000 honor for the George D. Yancopoulos Innovator Award, which goes to the best first-place project based on outstanding and innovative research as well as the potential impact of her work.

Dunbar also had two other students to place in their respective divisions at ISEF. Alex Thuringer was fourth in Engineering Technology for “An Improved Color Filter Array Design Using Metafilters,” and Joseph Vulakh placed fourth in Mathematics for “Twisted Homogeneous Racks over the Alternating Groups.” 

Grace, 16, won the Materials Science category with her entry, “Novel Chemical Doping Strategy to Enhance N-Type Organic Electrochemical Transistors.” Her research was on building a better organic electrochemical transistor that she hopes will be used to develop new electronic devices that could help detect and treat serious illnesses like diabetes, epilepsy, and organ failure.

Contact: Elizabeth Pelphrey, MSTC facilitator at Dunbar