YES, SHE’S GOT IT! Yesterday, Kiranmai Uppuluri – a young researcher from our Institute – gave an amazing speech on her project and was rewarded with the audience award and… YES, she took 1st place (ex aequo) at the Falling Walls contest! Thus, she’s going to Berlin in November to take part in the Falling Walls Science Summit where global leaders in science, politics, business, and media gather to answer the question: “Which are the next walls to fall in science and society?“

Let’s learn more about her speech on “Breaking the walls of gaps in water data”! It’s worth saying that Kiran knows how to win people’s hearts. It’s been like a one-man show! Metaphors, enthusiasm, passion – All of that and more could be found in her presentation!

Since on Sunday it’s  World Water Monitoring Day, it’s a great occasion to remind you of an interview with her so we’re posting a part of it below as a teaser.

Here at Łukasiewicz – IMiF, I basically make sensors for water. Currently, we have very traditional methods of measuring water. Recently, I have spoken about sensors to make them smaller. Traditional water sensors look like this (Kiranmai is showing me the one). We need an electrolyte solution to store it which is a problem, it’s bulky, it’s made of glass, and if I hit it, it will break. What we are trying to do instead is to replace it with this (she is showing me a very small sensor). It’s small, handy, it will not break easily, it’s stable and this aluminum side can be used again.

That was the first part of my job here which I started 3 years ago. But now we are moving a bit forward, we are using these sensors to be applied in remote sensing devices. It looks like this (she is showing me a device). Best part, it gives you real-time data. It’s instantaneous! We are sitting here, Vistula river is over there. And I have all the information about the Vistula river on my phone. What is the temperature right now, what is the pH, etc.

Read the whole interview HERE.

Congratulations to Kiran and Agnieszka Żuchowska from Warsaw University of Technology who has also taken 1st place!