Young scientist earns national recognition

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This article was published 24/05/2021 (1647 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

For a project two years in the making, Emily Robb earned the silver excellence medal in the senior category at last week’s Canada Wide Science Fair.

Hosted virtually, the national event had the Vincent Massey High School Grade 12 student present to judges from home.

Her silver placement fell between presentations about reversing colon cancer and non-invasive eye surgery.

“I’m the person growing lettuce in her basement,” she said with a chuckle. “It definitely reinforces my ideologies about this being important.”

Robb’s interest in agriculture began at a young age, when she spent time at her grandparents’ farm south of Kemnay.

“It seems very important to me when you step back and look at everything,” she said. “Nothing would even exist without agriculture.”

She carried this interest over the years, which eventually translated into her annual science project, which she’d contribute to the Western Manitoba Science Fair.

She started in Grade 10 with a project about TV and computer time among her peers, and later shifted toward her agricultural interests.

Her 2019 effort found her earn gold at the intermediate level nationally — a project she describes as a “beta test” for the project she’d planned on presenting at last year’s event.

That was, until last year’s event — both the qualifying local fair and the national effort — was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

She still put together a video presentation for the regional fair, but held onto the results for a much greater presentation the following year.

Her study was on hydroponic fertilizers and how they affect the biomass output of arugula lettuce.

Last year’s study included 27 treatments, which took 24 weeks to grow everything and a few months of data interpretation.

This, she said, offered her a ballpark conclusion, which was fine-tuned the following year for this year’s final presentation.

The winning fertilizer combination was a mix between Advanced Nutrients macronutrients and High Output Garden micronutrients.

“It’s unconventional, kind of weird, but it worked the best out of everything,” Robb said.

The implications are wide-reaching.

As her project’s introduction notes, Earth’s population is growing and will demand greater strains on the agricultural sector.

“Creative and innovative ways of increasing food production abilities are at the forefront of research into the future of agriculture.”

Robb’s final project, available online at projectboard.world/ysc/cwsf-espc-2021, appears more like a PhD thesis than something compiled by a high school student, with detailed charts mapping the progress of each treatment.

It’s fitting, then, that Robb has been accepted into the University of Manitoba’s four-year bachelor of science (agroecology) program, through which she intends to pursue a career related to regenerative agriculture.

True to her interests, the work area in her family’s basement where she studied arugula has since been altered to accommodate a hatchery for chickens — a 4-H project.

Having gained national attention for her efforts, Robb said she’d encourage other youths interested in pursuing projects their peers might see as “weird” to keep with it.

“If you have a drive to do something and you’re willing to make it happen, you’re totally capable of doing that,” she said.

Success might not happen at first, she said, adding she spent years studying fertilizers and agriculture-related sciences before anything came of it.

In the end, she said it has been totally worth it.

The recognition Robb has received was well-deserved, said Charlotte McConnell, a volunteer behind the Western Manitoba Science Fair.

“She spent a lot of time on her projects, and months and months of research and data collection,” she said, adding Robb has proven thorough and knowledgeable in her field.

Earning silver at nationals is a significant feather in Robb’s cap, McConnell said, and she deserves extra kudos for sticking up with the virtual-only makeup of this year’s event.

Despite some challenges adapting to a virtual fair, McConnell said local youths appear to have come out if it with a positive experience in their memories.

She said the hope is that next year’s fairs will finally be held in-person again.

» tclarke@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @TylerClarkeMB