Like a lot of high school students, Austin Wang isn’t exactly sure what he’s going to do with his life.
But after winning in his division at the International BioGENEius Challenge last week in Philadelphia for his work with microbial fuel cells, it’s clear the Grade 11 student from David Thompson Secondary in Vancouver has a lot of options.
The contest is the premier event of its kind in the biotechnology field.
Wang, 17, finished ahead of 28 other competitors from the U.S., Canada and Germany to take the Global Environment Challenge and $7,500 US for identifying genes that generate electricity from bacteria.
The project required knowledge of engineering, biology, chemistry, genetics and physics, as well as computer analysis.
“The beauty of this project is I get a mix of everything,” Wang said Sunday. “I find I enjoy a lot of different things.”
Wang, who also composes music on the piano and plays basketball, still doesn’t know what his career will be.
“I ask myself the same question all the time,” he said. “I really don’t know what I want to study.
“I’m still trying to explore, trying to find what I enjoy doing.”
The bacteria in Wang’s fuel cells were fed a synthetic food source.
“In real life, these bacteria will run off waste material, such as waste water or sewage or sludge,” he said. “It treats the waste water while generating electricity — and potentially clean water.
“We put in a lot of energy treating waste water, when in fact waste water actually contains a lot of energy,” he said.
There’s even the possibility the bacteria could be used to clean oil spills or other contaminants in water.
While his ultimate path is unclear, Wang has definite plans for his prize money and the summer.
“Probably I’ll donate some to charity and save the rest to continue the project,” he said.
“I want to keep working in the lab, hopefully without distraction from school, so I can advance the project and take it to the next level.”
The next phase of Wang’s project might be finding a better bacteria than the non-pathogenic E. coli he used in his fuel cells.
“E. coli is really easy to work with genetically, but it’s not really good at generating electricity,” he explained.
While he’s a prize winner, Wang knows he hasn’t accomplished all this on his own.
He made special mention of mentor Dr. Susan Baldwin of the University of B.C., Science World (which did 3-D printing of his cell prototype), contest sponsor Sanofi and his father, Hopkins Wang.
