22 of the 82 Materials Science and Engineering projects at ISEF 2026 won a Grand Award. Here's every one, with its abstract.
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science First Award
The pulp and paper industry drives massive deforestation and CO2 emissions, while 1.3 billion tonnes of biopolymer-rich food waste are discarded annually, representing a vast, untapped resou…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science First Award
Plastic recycling is limited by mis-sorting across polymer families and additives. Current identification methods, such as SPI resin codes, labels, and visible/near-infrared/Fourier Transfor…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Second Award
Arsenic (As) is a known carcinogen, and its contamination of groundwater is a major global public health concern, with approximately 200 million people at risk of arsenic poisoning. Addressi…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Second Award
Button Battery Ingestion (BBI) constitutes a global emergency, reporting over 300,000 cases annually, primarily affecting children under six due to natural exploration, resulting in hundreds…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Second Award
Despite decades of medical advancement, cancer continues to claim about 10 million lives annually. mRNA therapeutics represent a promising approach for cancer immunotherapy, particularly bec…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Second Award
This study optimizes the composition and factors of potassium superoxide (KO2) and calcium hydroxide (Ca(OH)2) for use in a chemical oxygen generator (COG) for emergency escape devices. The…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Third Award
Globally, every 1 in 10 babies are born prematurely, their lives dependent on neonatal incubators to maintain a high humidity environment and reduce water loss through their immature skin. H…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Third Award
Unexpected polymorphic transitions occur in over 50% of pharmaceutical drugs as they pack themselves into 2+ distinct lattice arrangements. These differing molecular structures destabilize t…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Third Award
Over 2 billion people globally lack access to fresh water, and in recent years, fog harvesting has emerged as a promising solution in water-scarce regions. Yet, the only widely implemented s…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Third Award
Skin cancer drives a global crisis with >7 million projected annual cases, yet clinical diagnostics remain inaccessible. This profound socioeconomic barrier is mirrored in Arizona, where the…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Third Award
Slips, Trips, and Falls (STFs) are major sources of accidents among various populations. About 38 mill falls happen each year in the US alone, with more than 50,000 associated with mobility…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Third Award
Reducing carbon emissions in modern engineering has a critical tradeoff: materials must be lightweight to improve energy efficiency, yet strong enough to maintain structural integrity. Polye…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Third Award
Vanadium dioxide (VO2) thin films display an intriguing insulator-to-metal phase transition, which results in a distinct change in infrared (IR) transmittance across the solar spectrum. This…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Fourth Award
Artificial intelligence hardware is increasingly constrained by the energy cost of data movement: a single DRAM access can consume 200× the energy of an on-chip compute operation. Neuromorph…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Fourth Award
Scanning transmission electron microscopy (S/TEM) is essential for atomic-scale research that drives advances in energy materials and nanotechnology, but its operation is limited by labor-in…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Fourth Award
Large-scale reforestation efforts often struggle due to the large cost associated with seeding and low growth yield due to pest predation on seeds. To negate pests, blanket application of ch…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Fourth Award
Microbial contamination in healthcare and marine environments compromises safety and incurs billions in costs. To address this, a parametric study was conducted on eight cast Cu-Zn-Al-Sn all…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Fourth Award
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are anthropogenic contaminants used in superomniphobic products, due to the exceptional stability of their carbon–fluorine bonds, that allow them t…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Fourth Award
Freshwater is becoming a depleting resource globally due to climate change, urbanization, and pollution. Thus, there is an urgent need for decentralized and energy-efficient freshwater gener…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Fourth Award
Oil spills cause large-scale destruction of marine ecosystems and economies. Current remediation methods primarily rely on mechanical recovery, typically recovering only 2-6% of spilled oil.…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Fourth Award
Negative environmental and health-related impacts of real and synthetic leather production have prompted interest in biobased alternatives that maintain functional performance while reducing…
ISEF · 2026
Materials Science Fourth Award
The main goal of my project is to 3D print flexible objects with designed magnetisation. Such structures are capable of shifting geometry when the external magnetic field is applied and retu…