First Update!

This is Charlotte Andrews, from Laguna Beach High School, with an update on our progress.  Recently we have enjoyed small-scale media fame as local newspapers have been publishing articles about our InvenTeam's success, since winning the first place prize at the TEDx Teen Challenge in late September. Once the InvenTeams press release crossed the wire on October 15th, we recieved a second wave of media attention. In additon, we presented our design to the Laguna Beach Unified School District School Board on October 28th, and will present our design to the Laguna Hills City Counsel on November 25th.

Since then, we have begun working on bringing our design to life. Bryson Elghanayan has spearheaded the engineering of the parabolic reflector, which will be used in our invention to reflect UV light into the acrylic piping to break apart the hydrogen peroxide into free radicals. Another group of InvenTeam members led by Nolan Gunsolley has begun working with the photocatalyst. Our first successful sample of the photocatalyst was synthesized last week at UCI with the help of Xiaowei Li. Further testing needs to be done on the sample, but the substance has the same physical qualities one would hope to see in graphitic carbon nitride. (Photo of the synthesized sample above in post). 

We look forward to continuing gaining publicity and experimenting with our photocatalyst. More updates to come!