Hartford, CT — Connecticut’s most promising young scientists and engineers were honored by the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering at its 27th Annual Meeting and Awards Dinner on May 8, 2002 at the Radisson Conference Center in Cromwell. With more than 100 Academy members and dignitaries, including Commissioner of Higher Education Valerie Lewis, Connecticut Employment and Training Commission Chairman Wally Barnes, and Connecticut Economic Resource Center President Marty Hunt, looking on, the top winners of the Connecticut Science Fair and the 2002 Connecticut Intel Science Talent Search received awards from the Academy. Also honored were high school science departments from around the state who had student winners in the Connecticut Junior Science and Humanities Symposium. For the first time this year, winners of the state’s 2002 Invention Convention also received recognition during the evening’s festivities.

West Hartford’s Jacob Licht, a senior at William H. Hall High School, was the first place winner in both the Connecticut Science Fair—Senior Physical Sciences Division and the Connecticut Intel Science Talent Search. Licht won for his project entitled “Rainbow Ramsey Theory: Rainbow Arithmetic Progressions and Anti-Ramsey Results.”

Sasha Gusev, a senior from Daniel Hand High School in Madison, received the Academy’s award as the first place winner in the Connecticut Science Fair—Senior Biological Sciences Division for his project entitled “Fractal Classification of DNA Sequences.”

Johann Cutiongco, also from William H. Hall High School in West Hartford, received an award as the second place winner in the 2002 Connecticut Intel Science Talent Search. Cutiongco’s project was entitled “A Comparison of Competing Models for IP3 Receptor Channel Regulation Using the Virtual Cell Modelling Framework.”

Also honored with awards during the evening were the high schools that produced the top five winners in the Connecticut Junior Science and Humanities Symposium. East Lyme High School was the first place winner, with Greenwich High School placing second in the competition. Third place winners were New Fairfield High School, Lyme-Old Lyme High School and Hamden High School.

Four newly elected members of the Academy were also recognized during the evening, including Professor Yaakov Bar-Shalom of the University of Connecticut, Professor Paul Fleury, Dean of Engineering at Yale University, Dr. James C. Hogan, Jr., of the Connecticut Department of Public Health, and Professor Lee Langston, of the University of Connecticut.

Preceding the award presentations, BEACON president and Academy vice president Joseph D. Bronzino, Vernon Roosa Professor of Applied Science at Trinity College, presented an overview of the evolution of medical technologies, and the role of Hartford-based BEACON in the current and future development of these technologies in the state of Connecticut.