WASHINGTON — Three of the United States’ brightest high school scientists will emerge winners on Tuesday in the $1 million Intel Talent Search, considered to be among the top U.S. competitions for young innovators.
The 40 finalists faced a final competition in Washington before the announcement of the winners at a black-tie dinner, according to the Society for Science and the Public, which runs the event. Two of the finalists are from Maine. They are Bangor High School senior Paige Brown and Demetri Maxim, a senior at Gould Academy in Bethel.
The winners in three categories — basic research, global good and innovation — will each get $150,000 in scholarship money. Second-place finishers will each get $75,000, and third-place prizes are $35,000.
The finalists are from 38 schools in 18 states. Two schools had two finalists apiece — Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland, and the Massachusetts Academy of Math and Science in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Fifty-two percent of the finalists are female.
Past participants have received some of the world’s top science honors, including 12 Nobel Prizes, 11 National Medals of Science and 18 MacArthur Foundation Fellowships.
The competition is sponsored by semiconductor maker Intel Corporation.
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