Young talent competitionNational winner of 'Jugend forscht 2019' chosen
Germany's best young researchers in the 54th national 'Jugend forscht' competition have been chosen. Artificial intelligence (AI) is playing an increasingly important role in the young talents' projects. The winners from the specialist areas and the special prize winners in a picture gallery.
'Prize of the Federal Minister of Education for the best interdisciplinary work 2019' for Max Asenow (18), Tina Munkewitz (18) and Milena Wiegand (18):
Using fluorescent dyes, vital proteins in cells can be marked and their metabolism made visible. Milena Wiegand, Max Asenow and Tina Munkewitz synthesized two new fluorescent dyes - matao blue I and matao blue II. They used these to stain bacteria, cancer cells and plant samples. Under the fluorescence microscope, they could see that different proteins were marked blue in the different cell types: In the bacteria, the dyes collected at the cell poles, in the cancer cells in the area around the nucleus. Evaluating the analysis data was more difficult than expected. The young researchers therefore developed software that allows the data to be processed more quickly and easily.