Now in its fifth year, CERN-ISEF award continues to bring some of the best and brightest young minds to the laboratory. Twelve winners are selected from over 1500 students who participated in the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) – the world's largest pre-university science competition. Their prize: an exclusive tour of CERN, complete with an extensive programme of talks and visits given by some of its most experienced physicists and engineers.
This year, the student’s weeklong itinerary included trips all across the CERN site: from the CMS cavern to the LEIR accelerator, they were given a complete picture of CERN's activities. “We were all impressed by the diversity of the work being done,” says Vincent Cao, 17. “You’ve got computer scientists, theoretical physicists, engineers – but you’ve also got a people working in medical disciplines and dealing technology transfer.”
Zeyu Liu, 17, says the trip really opened his eyes. "It was amazing to see engineering at the limits of technology. Being able to see ATLAS, CMS, the CERN Computing Centre and the accelerators was a dream come true.”
As well as touring CERN, the students visited the salt mines of Bex and the city of Lausanne in Switzerland as well as Mont Blanc in France. “The sheer scale of the trip has been extraordinary; it’s been an amazing experience all-round,” says Valerie Sarge, 16.