On Saturday 8 February Cornelis Janse van Niekerk and Isobel Kolbe participated in the Gauteng regional heats in Johannesburg. Only 20 young scientists are selected countrywide to advance to the semi-finals. They will be attending a master’s class in science communication from 11 to 13 March, an event that will be followed by the semi-finals and finals. The latter will take place at Scifest Africa, a science festival held annually in Grahamstown. The winner of the South African competition goes through to the international FameLab-competition in England.

Cornelis is an engineering student who is pursuing a master’s degree in metallurgy and spoke about lasers and the use of lasers in the modification of certain metals.

Isobel Kolbe, an honours student in physics, spoke about the Higgs-Boson-particle.

Read more about FameLab at www.britishcouncil.org.za/famelab