The Supercomputing Challenge Winners, 2010-2011

Duncan McBranch, Deputy Principal Associate Director for Science, Technology and Engineering, LANL, welcomed 50 teams from around the state to Los Alamos National Laboratory at the Challenge Awards Ceremony on April 26th.

Top prize at the Supercomputing Challenge Awards Day was captured by Cole Kendrick from Los Alamos Middle School and he was awarded a $1,000 check. The team mentor is Brian Kendrick. Cole also received the best use of Visualization and Parallel Processing awards, from New Mexico Tech Computer Science and Engineering Department. Cole's topic was the Computer Simulation of Dark Matter Effects on Galaxy Rotation. Cole also won the Crowd Favorite picked by the teachers and students, following a gallery walk to see all of the project posters.

Second Prize was awarded to Team 56, from Los Alamos High School. The team members are Peter Ahrens, Dustin Tauxe, and Stephanie Djidjev. Each team member received $500. Their project is called BrilliAnts. Their sponsoring teacher is Lee Goodwin and their mentor is Christine Ahrens. They also received best use of Python award for $100 from Four Watch Software. And that's not all; they also won the Cray High Performance Computing Award.

Third Prize is a tie between Eldorado/ La Cueva High School Teams from Albuquerque and Desert Academy from Santa Fe.

La Cueva High School & Eldorado's project is Digital Analysis and Synthesis of Musical Recordings, Team Members are Alexandra Porter and Evan Roche and their teacher sponsor is Jennifer Coughlin. They also won the Sandia Creativity and Innovation Award.

Desert Academy Team Members are Sean Colin-Ellerin and Sara Hartse. Their Mentors are John Paterson and Jocelyne Comstock. Their topic is The North Pacific Gyre. They also won the Best Professional Presentation award from Santa Fe Complex.

Additional Finalist teams were:

AIMS@UNM, Team 5, Rehabilitation of the Rio Grande Silvery Minnow
Team Members: Nico Ponder, Stefan Klosterman, Louis Jencka, Jake Kileen
Sponsor: Terrence Lebeck, Mentor: Frederick Bobberts.
They also won the Environmental Modeling Award.

Albuquerque Academy, Team 7, Characterizing the Effects of Asteroid Belt Perturbations on the Orbits of the Inner Planets,
Team Member: Nikita Bogdanov
Teacher Sponsor: Jim Mims, Mentor: Dr. Marc A. Murison.
The Best Written Report was presented to Team 7 from Albuquerque Academy. It was awarded by Kathy Pallis and Sue King, technical writers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.

Los Alamos High, Team 66, Simulations for Radiation Diffusion in Nuclear Accidents,
Team Members: Edward Dai, Judy Lee,
Sponsor: Lee Goodwin, Mentor: William Dai

Los Alamos Middle School, Team 69, Package Sorting Logistics,
Team Members: Sudeep Dasari, David Murphy, Colin Redman
Sponsor: Wyatt Dumas, Mentors: Elizabeth Cooper, Jim Redman

Robertson High, Las Vegas, Team 107, Wind Energy in the United States,
Team Members: Jacob Bakarich, Jacob Ratzlaff
Sponsor: Mike Boyle, Mentor: David West

Saturday Science and Math Academy, Team 112, Rush Hour Traffic School,
Team Member: Daniel Washington, Mentor: Wayne Witzel

Each team took home posters for their school trophy cabinets plus a large banner for their gym and $50 for each student.

The Science Rocks award went home with Bernalillo High School with their project The Effectiveness of Zombies. Team Members were Lorenzo Rivera Lanza, and Joseph Kloeppel and teacher sponsors are Valerie Salas and Jennifer Halpain.

Team 103 from Quemado won the Best Technical Poster Award. Multi-Touch Surface Team Members are Jose Mora, Justin Miller and Michael O'Dell. Their Teacher Sponsor is Tim Angelus. Their poster will be the front cover for the 2011 - 2012 Final Reports which will be published for the Kickoff in October 2011. This award was presented by Nerissa Whittington from Big Byte.

McCurdy School, Espanola, won the best Challenge Process, Special Judges; Award for their work in Contributing Factors to Obesity, Part 2. Team members are Lindsay Redman, Marisa Griego and Ernesto Gonzalez, and their teacher sponsor is Irina Cislaru.

The New Mexico Network for Women and Science and Engineering chose Robertson High, project Specifires, to honor a team with a majority of young women.

The Climate Change award goes to Aspen Elementary's Global Warming, what can we do about it? Sara Shiina worked with teacher sponsor, Zeynep Unal and mentor, Toshiyuki Shiina. This award was sponsored by NM EPSCoR.

The NM Museum of Natural History and Science awarded the Modeling Southwest Ecosystems prize for $100 to Hatch Valley High for their project Predicting Pungency in Chile. Team members are Joel Cazares, Selinda Garay, sponsor, Creighton Edington and mentor: Nick Bennett.

Teamwork Award from CHECS, the New Mexico Council for Higher Education Computing/Communication Service, went Los Alamos Middle with their project Reintroduction of the Mexican Gray Wolf. Team Members are Madeline Lockhart, Sean Reynolds, and Ronald "Derek" Selvage. They also received $100 for the Best Web Presentation of a Final Report. Sponsor is Wyatt C. Dumas and their mentor is David C. Keller.

The Best Researched Project awarded by CHECS to Sandia Prep's Orbital Solar Panels. Team Members are Alex Burd, and Caitlyn Scharmer and the teacher sponsor is Neil McBeth.

Team 9, from Annunciation Catholic School, Anjitha Saji won the Modeling Perseverance, a Judges' Special Award. Her project was entitled Cars and Harmful Ozone. The teacher sponsor is Mary Sagartz.

Freedom High from Albuquerque received the Community Focus Award, Fathoming Fortune at Freedom. Their sponsor is Richard Foust. Team members are Joel Sandoval, Holly Campbell, Brion Willis, Chris Marroquin and SaraJade Chavez. Ron Davis from Abba Technologies gave the award.

Nick Bennett from Numerix received the Service Award for his continued mentorship and judging expertise.

Picacho Middle School project Impact of the Salt Cedar in the Southwest is taking home the Jeff Bingaman Middle School Award. Team members are Jasmine Munoz, Felicia Martinez, Manases Gomez, and Alfredo Carrasco. Sponsors are Gloria Kindig, Veronica Montoya, Eva Moreno, Anna Gutierrez. Mentors are Richard Oliver and Nick Bennett.

Betsy Frederick was awarded the Challenge Leadership award for her amazing contribution to the Supercomputing Challenge and her 50 year teaching career. We wish her the very best with her move to CT.

Gloria Kindig, and her partners Veronica Montoya, Anna Gutierrez and Eva Moreno, Picacho Middle School, won the Newcomer Award for being first year teacher sponsors who fielded three Challenge teams.

Team 16 from Bernalillo and their teacher sponsors, Valerie Salas and Jennifer Halpain, won the Magellan Award for bringing computer science to the Bernalillo school community and taking the Challenge. Team Members are Lorenzo Rivera Lanza and Joseph Kloeppel.

The Graphical Poster award went to Team 11. This design will become next year's logo and will appear on t-shirts, the website and teacher bags. Aspen School, 11, team members were Kai Coblenz, Claire DeCroix, and Kaan Unal, Their teacher sponsor is Zeynep Udal.

Students nominate teacher sponsors for recognition. This year's winners are Sam Smith, La Cueva, Albuquerque, nominated by Stephanie Djidjev and Gloria Kindig, Picacho Mid, Las Cruces, nominated by Jasmine Munoz.

This year the Challenge was given $25,000 from LANL's Division of Computer, Computational, and Statistical Sciences Division for scholarship awards. An additional $5000 came from LANS, $2500 came from Intel, $1200 from the Challenge for the Willard Smith Scholarships and $9,000 was given by in-state colleges and universities. Students receiving scholarships were

Now in to its 22nd year, the Challenge was open to any New Mexico high-school or middle-school student. Over the past year, schools around the state researched scientific problems, developed sophisticated computer programs, learned computer science with mentors from the state's national laboratories and other organizations, and got the opportunity to run their programs on some of the world's most powerful computers.

The goal of the year-long event was to increase knowledge of science and computing; expose students and teachers to computers and applied mathematics; and instill enthusiasm for science in middle- and high-school students, their families and communities. Participating students improve their understanding of technology by developing skills in scientific inquiry, modeling, computing, communications and teamwork.

See the Supercomputing Challenge Sponsors.