Fans, filter paper and plantain peels: what 13- to 15-year-old inventors built this year

The biggest invention news for kids this fall didn't come from a fancy lab. Last week, the top prize at the 2026 Thermo Fisher Scientific Junior Innovators Challenge, one of the best-known science and engineering contests for middle schoolers in the US, went to a 15-year-old who built an air sampler from a small fan and filter paper. Another winner, 13, turned cafeteria plantain peels into a garden mulch. That's "you can just make things" in its plainest form: notice a problem, then use what's around you.

Here's what the winners made, what they have in common, and how a 6-year-old can start the same way this weekend.

What did this year's young inventors make?

The 30 finalists presented their projects in Washington, D.C., at a public showcase on October 24, and the winners were announced on October 28. A few of the projects:

• An air sampler made with a fan and filter paper. Bailey Quinn Frank, 15, from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, won the $25,000 top award. She built a low-cost device that pulls air through filter paper with a small fan to catch bacteria floating in the air. Scientists can then check what's on the paper. She designed it for rural communities, where it's hard to keep track of germs that might make people sick.
• Weed-blocking mulch made from plantain peels. Wileidy Enid Feliciano-Rivera, 13, from Peñuelas, Puerto Rico, won the invention award. She collected plantain peels from her school cafeteria and turned them into a biodegradable mulch, the layer gardeners spread on soil to stop weeds. In her tests it blocked weeds about as well as plastic mulch. It also kept the soil cooler and wetter.
• A fire-stopping gel sprayer. Twins Henry and Jack Grover, 14, from Riverside, California, were inspired by the 2025 Palisades fire. They tested water-absorbing gels to see which could stop burned ground from catching fire again. The winner was sodium polyacrylate, the same stuff that soaks up water in disposable diapers. Then they designed a sprayer to put it where it's needed.
• Germ-fighting plants from the family farm. Locklyn Ward, 14, from Grove, Oklahoma, won the leadership award. As Science News Explores reported on October 27, she boiled pieces of 24 plants from her family's farm and soaked paper disks in the liquid. Then she set the disks on dishes of bacteria. Thirteen of the 24 plants killed some bacteria. None worked as well as today's medicines, and she reported that honestly.
• Computer help for a family problem. Myreen Ahsan, 14, from Friendswood, Texas, was inspired by her grandfather's dementia. She used machine learning to search for molecules that might one day help treat a form of it.

What do these projects have in common?

Read the list again and you'll see three things every one of them shares.

They started with a problem the kid could see. Germs in rural towns, plastic in gardens, wildfires near home, a grandfather's illness. Nobody started with "I want to win a science fair." They started with something that mattered to them.

They used what was close by. A fan. Filter paper. Peels from the lunchroom. Plants from the backyard. Science starts with what's around you, and the expensive equipment comes later, if ever.

They tested and told the truth about the results. Locklyn's plants didn't beat antibiotics, and that's part of the story, not a failure. A test that says "not yet" is still a test that taught you something.

None of that requires being 14. It requires noticing, making, and checking.

How can a younger kid start the same way?

A younger kid starts by finding a problem close to home and making a rough version of a fix. The projects above took months. A first project can take one afternoon.

Go on a problem-spotting walk. Walk through the house, the yard, or the classroom with a notebook. Write down everything that's annoying, wasteful, broken, or messy. Food scraps going in the trash? A plant that keeps wilting? A dark corner where toys get lost? (Our guide on how kids come up with inventions has a longer version of this walk.)

Raid the recycling. Before buying anything, ask: what could we build this from? Cardboard, tape, string, bottles, peels, leaves, a small fan, a flashlight. The winners above proved that ordinary materials are enough to do real science.

Draw it first. Have your kid draw the invention with labels for each part: what it is, what it does, who uses it. A drawing is cheap to change, and it's how kids think a design through.

Run one fair test. Change one thing and keep everything else the same. Two pots of soil, one with peels on top and one without. Two paper filters, one near the kitchen and one near the window. Then write down what happened, even if it's "nothing."

Show someone. Explaining a project out loud, to a grandparent, a friend, or a class, is how young scientists learn what to try next. Every finalist above had to do it.

Where does Kubrio fit?

Kubrio is a set of studios where kids 6–13 make real things, and I built it around the same habit these winners share: your kid's own idea comes first, drawn on paper. The free Design thinking for kids course walks a kid from a problem at home to a fix they built. In Robotics Studio, kids design a robot for a job and program it. Whatever they make goes into their portfolio, so they have something real to show, just like the finalists did.

What to do at home this week

1. Read one of the projects above aloud with your kid and ask, "What problem was she trying to fix?"
2. Take a 10-minute problem-spotting walk and write down five problems.
3. Pick one, and draw an invention that could help.
4. Build the roughest version you can from things you already have.
5. Run one fair test and write down what happened.
6. Show it to someone outside your home and ask, "What would make it better?"

FAQ

What is the Thermo Fisher Scientific Junior Innovators Challenge? It's a US science and engineering competition for middle school students, run by Society for Science. Each year 30 finalists present their research and compete in team challenges for awards, with a $25,000 top prize.

Do kids need expensive equipment to do real science? No. This year's winners used a small fan, filter paper, cafeteria peels and farm plants. Most first projects need only household materials, a notebook and a fair test.

What's a good first invention project for a 7-year-old? Pick a small problem at home, like a messy shoe pile or a forgotten plant. Then draw a fix and build it from cardboard and tape. Test it on whoever has the problem.

What if my kid's experiment doesn't work? That's still science. Locklyn Ward's plants didn't beat antibiotics, but 13 of them killed some bacteria, and she shared exactly what happened. Help your kid write down the result and decide what to change next.

How do kids find a problem worth solving? They look close to home. Ask your kid to list things that bug them, waste something, or make someone's day harder. Then ask, "What would you make to fix that?"