IRELAND - The 2014 Google Science Fair has announced its winners, Ciara Judge, Émer Hickey and Sophie Healy-Thow, three 16 year old Irish students who showed that the nitrogen-fixing bacteria, diazatrophic rhizobia, could increase the yields of traditionally low-yield crops. By introducing this bacteria to over 10,000 seeds used to grow cereal grains, germination time was cut in half and drymass yields shot up 74% over average.

Could this crop yield breakthrough be expanded into the fruits and vegetables cultivated in the produce industry? 

“These results have significant potential for increasing yields of food crops and reducing losses due to adverse weather conditions,” the girls shared in their Google Fair submission, according to Inhabitat. “They also offer opportunities for reducing the environmental footprint of agriculture by reducing fertilizer usage. As demand for cereals increases with population growth, this discovery could act as a partial solution to the impending food poverty crisis. There is potential for future work in this area and we plan to investigate the biochemical mechanism involved and carry out more extensive field trials.”

Check out the entry video of these aspiring scientists to find out more about their project:

This is certainly an impressive acheivement for three 16 year olds. So far, the experiments have been limited to just cereal grains, but I'd be interested in seeing if it would be possible for it to be incorporated into the growing techniques used in the fresh produce industry. 

According to Inhabitat, Ciara, Émer, and Sophie are not unaccustomed to honors from the science community. They won first place in a national science competition in 2013 and represented Ireland in the European Contest for Young Scientists in September 2013, winning top honors there again.

As the winners of the Google Science Fair, the three will receive a 10-day trip to the Galapagos Islands courtesy of National Geographic, a $50,000 scholarship from Google, and other prizes from LEGO Education and the Virgin Galactic Spaceport in the Mojave desert.

Congratulations on this very impressive achievement, Ciara, Émer, and Sophie!