A Way to Turn Plastic Waste into $78 Million of Biofuel

16-year-old Egyptian student Azza Abdel Hamid Faiad, meanwhile, was at work finding a
way to make use of waste plastic. The budding scientist discovered a catalyst that could turn
Egypts one million tons of annually discarded plastic into a phenomenal $78 million worth
of biofuel each year. She hopes that the development could provide an economically
efficient method for production of hydrocarbon fuel, and many appear to agree; Faiad has
been awarded the European Fusion Development Agreement award at the 23rd European
Union Contest for Young Scientists, and is seeking patents for her discovery.

Turning Banana Peels into Bioplastic

16-year-old Turkish student Elif Bilgin developed her very own technique for turning
the unassumingbanana peel into bioplastics, a discovery which she hopes could
reduce dependence on petrochemicals, and make use of some of the 200 tons of
banana peel discarded daily in Thailand alone. Her development relies on the
properties of the starches and cellulose found in the outer layer of banana peels,
which, through a chemical process developed by Bilgin herself, can be transformed
into a non-decaying bioplastic.

A Pee-Powered Energy Generator Created by Four Nigerian

Teenagers
Four Nigerian teenage girls wowed visitors to the Maker Faire Africa with their pee-powered
energy generator. Able to source an impressive six hours of power from just one liter of
urine, the 14- and 15-year-olds renewable energy generator holds interesting possibilities for
providing electricity in remote areas or in disaster zones.

A Quantum Space Propulsion System

It sounds more like something from a science fiction movie than a potentially viable
invention from a teenage mind (hence the Prometheus image), but 19-year-old Egyptian
physicist Aisha MustafasQuantum Space Propulsion System could send spacecraft into the
beyond without using a single drop of fuel. Mustafa believes that the quantum effect can be
harnessed in space via the dynamicCasimir effect and from that, energy can be created to
produce a net force that could push, pull or propel a spacecraft. Sohag University has already
aided Mustafa with her patent application, and she has said she intends to keep developing
the system before it is tested in outer space

A Solar Breakthrough Using Fibonacci Sequence

13-year-old Aidan Dwyer is by far the youngest of the brilliant teenage minds in our list.
The 7th grader observed the patterns of tree branches while he was on a hike and considered
that such patterns could be utilized to improve the efficiency of solar trees. By utilizing the
Fibonacci sequence, he was able to generate a formula that produced a solar tree design that
appeared to yield 20-50% more power than an equivalent flat solar array. While Dwyers
calculations werent absolutely correct, thebiomimicry experiment earned the 13-year-old a
provisional patent.

Turning Banana Peels into Bioplastic

16-year-old Turkish student Elif Bilgin developed her very own technique for turning the
unassumingbanana peel into bioplastics, a discovery which she hopes could reduce
dependence on petrochemicals, and make use of some of the 200 tons of banana peel
discarded daily in Thailand alone. Her development relies on the properties of the starches
and cellulose found in the outer layer of banana peels, which, through a chemical process
developed by Bilgin herself, can be transformed into a non-decaying bioplastic.

A Device That Can Charge Your Cellphone in 20 Seconds

18-year-old Californian Eesha Khare captured everyones attention with the creation of a
device thatcould charge cellphones in just 20 seconds and do away with the smartphone
battery-related anxiety once and for all. Khare developed a supercapacitor storage device that
can store a lot of energy and fit within a cell phone battery. Not only can the device charge
the phone at lightning-fast speed, it can also last for a whopping 100,000 charge cycles.

Wearing corrective eye glasses could soon be a thing of the past. The
Ocumetics Bionic Lens, invented by Dr. Garth Webb of Ocumetics Technology
Corp, claims to be a painless implant that could change impaired vision forever. In
fact, Webb claims the lens will go beyond the standard 20/20 vision, giving patients
the super power of seeing three times better.
Presented earlier this year at a cataract and refractive surgery conference, the
Ocumetic Bionic Lens was created after eight years of research and
experimentation. The project itself has cost a whopping $3 million in funding for
research, international patents, and trials. Webb says that with his procedure, which
takes just eight painless minutes, every person could have extraordinary eyesight.
Related: Australian Research Group Announces First Implantation of a Bionic
Eye:Instead of working like a contact lens, the Bionic Lens acts similarly to cataract
surgery, adhering to the eyes natural lens. The procedure can be done in an out
patient office, its steps simply having a saline solution with the lens flushed into the

eye with a syringe. After 10 seconds, the folded lens opens up, and moves itself over
the eyes natural lens. Webb says that immediately after the procedure, vision is
totally corrected, allowing patients to see farther and more clearly.
Patients with the bionic lens implanted would be safeguarded against cataracts in
the future, strengthening the eyes natural lens which is prone to decay. The
procedure is also thought to be safer than invasive laser surgery, with the simple
saline-flush process.
Webb hopes his patent will be available as soon as 2017, after more clinical trials.

Engineers at MIT spend a lot of time figuring out how to make things better, faster,
and often smaller. Now, powerful new magnet technology has led the way to a
groundbreaking design for a small, modular fusion ARC reactor that generates
the same amount of power as its larger predecessors. MIT researchers believe this
new concept could be realized in as little as 10 years, and this type of power
generation could be the clean, renewable energy the world has been waiting for.