Slovak young scientists were successful at the Genius Olympiad, an international competition for young scientists, which took place last week in Rochester, USA. Laura Kleinova and Natalia Ivanecka, students of the Jan Adam Rayman high school in Presov, won the gold medal in the science category for their presentation of the project Do common cosmetic products repel ticks? TASR was informed by Jan Nemec from the Association for Youth, Science and Technology (AMAVET). The students entered the international competition as winners of the national final of the AMAVET 2022 Science and Technology Festival. The scientific advisor for their project was Branislav Petko from the Institute of Parasitology of the Slovak Academy of Sciences. Michal Zajacek, who led the Slovak team, said that the girls continued to work on the project after the Science and Technology Festival, improving it both in terms of content and visuals. The gold medal is a great reward for their hard work on the project. Their project compared the repellancy of common cosmetic products, specifically shampoos, shower gels, perfumes and essential oils. In the study, which looked at the overall effect on over 1,600 ticks, they found that perfumes and essential oils were more repellent than shampoos. Based on this analysis, they have also created their own repellent product, coconut cream, which significantly repels ticks while being more environmentally friendly than traditional synthetic repellents. Slovakia was also represented at the event by Anna Penzesova from the St. Nicholas Grammar School in Presov, who advanced from the Biological Olympiad with her project on the effect of magnetized water on increasing the egg production of laying hens. She received an honourable mention at the competition in the USA.
Source: TASR
