Why This Science Project Catches the President’s Eye

Hannah Herbst, a 15-year-old and poised-beyond-her-years ninth-grader from Boca Raton, was able to catch the eye of President Obama during the White House Science Fair with her invention, the ocean energy probe. This technology can harness ocean currents to power a generator.

In a news flash on ABC News, President Barrack Obama stopped by Herbst's exhibit and even pulled a string which demonstrated electrical generation by a device with the use of sea water. This brilliant design was inspired by Herbst's Ethiopian pen pal as a means of providing aid to developing nations in finding an alternative stable power source with the use of untapped energy from ocean currents.

This young scientist intends to mass produce her one-in-a-million invention and give it away to needy communities in developing nations to power lights and even small medical devices as cited on Tech Insider. People are noticing this.

Moreover, Herbst said that she was not really interested in science until the seventh grade. That is the time when Herbst's father, the College of Education's Dean at Florida Atlantic University, signed her up for a summer engineering and technology camp. She was nevertheless far more interested in the performing arts.

"I got there, and I was the only girl," Herbst recalls. During the first day, the participants were told that they would create a robot. "I was so intimidated," she remembers. However, by the end of the summer, she was confident how to put it together all by herself.

In October last year, Hannah Herbst won $25,000 in a contest sponsored by 3M and Discovery. Named America's 2015 Top Young Scientist, she was mentored by Jeffrey Emslander who is a 3M scientist. His inventions have tremendously helped in the reduction of emissions to the environment and promoted less use of energy in the making of products. Herbst attends at the Alexander D. Henderson University School.