Tanay Tandon: Google Science Fair Finalist, 2015

Biography

One of twenty, out of thousands

EdTech Magazine published the finalist list on 11 August 2015. Thousands of teenagers from across the globe had entered; twenty projects survived to the global final. Tandon's entry is listed in a single line: delivering rapid, portable and automated blood morphology tests.

Blood morphology is the study of the shape, size and appearance of blood cells under a microscope, and it is the workhorse of haematological diagnosis. Anaemias, infections, parasites such as malaria and several leukaemias all announce themselves in cell shape. The test is cheap in reagents and expensive in people: it needs a trained technician and a laboratory microscope. Automating the reading, and making the device portable, is a way of moving that diagnosis to places where the technician is not.

The cohort he was judged against

The 2015 finalist list is a useful snapshot of what ambitious teenagers were building that year, and medicine dominated it. Anika Cheerla of the United States entered an automated diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease; Krtin Nithiyanandam of the United Kingdom, a molecular approach to Alzheimer's diagnosis and treatment; Adriel Sumathipala, rapid, portable and affordable early detection of cardiac disease; Olivia Hallisey, a way of using silk to store and transport Ebola antibodies.

Water and energy made up much of the rest. Calvin Rieder of Canada built a solar-powered device pulling drinkable water out of the air. Deepika Kurup worked on solar-powered silver technology for clean drinking water. Anela Arifi and Ilda Ismaili of Bosnia-Herzegovina turned chicken feathers and fat into hydrogen storage material and biodiesel. Eliott Sarrey of France built a gardening robot driven from a smartphone.

How the fair worked

The Google Science Fair was an online competition open to teenagers anywhere with an internet connection, which is why its finalist lists read like a map rather than a school district: in 2015 the twenty came from the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Singapore, Taiwan, France, Russia, Lithuania, India and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Entrants submitted their projects online; finalists were flown to Mountain View to face judges in person. EdTech Magazine gives the date of that final judging as 21 September 2015 and the grand prize as a $50,000 scholarship together with other prizes. Reaching the last twenty did not carry the grand prize, but it did carry a hearing in front of working scientists and engineers, which for a teenager with a diagnostic device is the scarcer commodity.

Why portable diagnostics kept winning

Four of the twenty 2015 finalists were working on ways to detect a disease earlier, faster or further from a hospital. That concentration is not an accident of judging taste. It reflects a shift that was under way across the whole field: smartphone cameras had become good enough to serve as microscopes and spectrometers, and image-classification software had become good enough, and cheap enough in computing terms, to be pointed at a slide.

The consequence for a teenager with a laptop is that a project that would have required a laboratory a decade earlier could be prototyped at a desk. The consequence for the judges is a harder question: whether a working prototype at a science fair says anything about whether the device would survive a clinic. The fair's own answer was to reward the attempt.

What is documented, and what is not

Firm: Tandon was named a global finalist at the 2015 Google Science Fair; his project was described as delivering rapid, portable and automated blood morphology tests; the twenty finalists were judged at Google's Mountain View headquarters on 21 September 2015; the grand prize was a $50,000 scholarship.

Not documented, in the source used here: his age, his school, his home state, the name of his device, whether it was ever tested clinically, whether he placed in the final judging, and what he has done since. Tandon's name has circulated since in connection with a medical technology company, but no source consulted for this page establishes that, and this page will not assert it.

Achievement Timeline

Tanay Tandon — every milestone on this page, in order.

2015

Enters the Google Science Fair, open tEnters the Google Science Fair, open to teenagers worldwide

11 Aug 2015

Named one of twenty global finalists; Named one of twenty global finalists; EdTech Magazine publishes the list

21 Sep 2015

The twenty finalists present to judgesThe twenty finalists present to judges at Google headquarters in Mountain View

Since 2015

No further published record found in tNo further published record found in the sources used for this page

Watch: Tanay Tandon on camera

Proclamation to Tanay TandonCity of Cupertino

Historical Comparison

Person	Country	Milestone	Age / Stat
Lauren Hodge	United States	Winning the 13-14 age category of the first Google Science Fair, in 2011…	Age 14
Sophie Healy-Thow	Ireland	Co-winning the Google Science Fair grand prize in 2014	Age 16
Tanay Tandon	United States	2015 Google Science Fair global finalist	—
Viney Kumar	Australia	Winner, 13-14 category, Google Science Fair 2013	—
Calvin Rieder	Canada	2015 Google Science Fair global finalist	—

What is documented — and what is not

✓ Documented

Named a 2015 Google Science Fair global finalist
Project described as rapid, portable, automated blood morphology tests
Finalists were judged at Google headquarters in Mountain View on 21 September 2015
The grand prize that year was a $50,000 scholarship

? Unverified, disputed or wrong

Age, school and home state are not stated in the source
Whether he placed in the final judging is not recorded here
Later company work is sometimes attributed to him but is not established by any source used for this page

Questions people ask about Tanay Tandon

What did Tanay Tandon do?

He was named one of twenty global finalists at the 2015 Google Science Fair for a project delivering rapid, portable and automated blood morphology tests.

Did he win the Google Science Fair?

The source used here names him as a global finalist, not as the grand prize winner. The grand prize that year was a $50,000 scholarship.

How old is Tanay Tandon?

No source consulted gives his age or birth year. The fair was open to teenagers.

What is blood morphology?

The study of the size, shape and appearance of blood cells, normally read by a trained technician down a microscope. Tandon's project aimed to make that reading rapid, portable and automatic.

Where is Tanay Tandon now?

No source consulted for this page records what he has done since 2015.

Who else was a 2015 finalist?

Among the twenty: Olivia Hallisey, Anika Cheerla, Krtin Nithiyanandam, Deepika Kurup, Calvin Rieder, Eliott Sarrey, and the Bosnian pair Anela Arifi and Ilda Ismaili.