Two Israeli teenagers have won first and second place in the First Step to Nobel Prize in Physics, an international physics competition open to students from around the world. Both are students in high schools affiliated with Bnei Akiva.
The first-place winner was Hadas Tzaban of Netivot. Hadas won for a project focusing on the elements affecting heat convection in a swirling motion.
Hadas' older sister, Mor, won second place in the same competition two years earlier.
The girls' principal, Sharona Meimon, described both Hadas and Mor as modest young women who excel in helping others. “They are modest despite their amazing accomplishments. Hadas volunteers in various places... She's always ready to help whoever needs help,” Meimon said.
The second-place winner was Itai Levi of the Yad Avraham high school in Netanya. Levi's project compared the heating properties of a metal ribbon and a metal thread.
The young scientist found that an amorphous (non-crystalline) ribbon of metal was a more effective heat source than a thread of crystalline metal. The latter heating form is currently more commonly used.