An 8-year-old New York student has been named a finalist in a national young inventors contest for creating a “dry eyes” onion-slicer.
Third-grader Rachael Kaminsky of Concord Road Elementary School in Ardsley said she got tired of weeping when chopping onions – and decided to do something about it.
“One day I was cooking an omelet with my mom. I started to cry when I cut the onions. I had to make it stop,” she said.
She submitted the idea for an onion-slicer in the 2000 Craftsman/National Science Teachers Association Young Inventors Award contest, and was selected as one of 12 national finalists.
Her dad, Paul, helped create the device.
The onions are contained in a bowl-shaped plastic food container. An apple-corer slices the onions at the bottom, and a small bag of baking soda and a pastry cloth are affixed inside the top to contain the powerful aroma.
Kaminsky has already won a $5,000 savings bond for being the regional finalist in the grades 2-5 category, and will make a trip to Chicago for the finals. If she wins, she’ll get another $5,000 bond.
“I’m really surprised. I always wanted to win something and never have,” she said.
Paul Kaminsky said: “The onion-slicer is a good idea and practical invention. She recognized a need and wanted to fulfill it.”
Meanwhile, a Bronx HS of Science student won a coveted Intel International Science award for her research to stop the spread of AIDS.
Monica Sircar, a 17-year-old senior who will attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the fall, studied a protein’s ability to isolate the HIV virus and stop it from spreading.
Her mother, Ratna, is associate professor of neurology and psychiatry at Albert Einstein College in The Bronx. Her father, Krishna, is a doctor.
Sircar did much of her lab research on AIDS as an intern at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and credited her mentor, Dr. Gun-Jam Kalpana, for guidance on the project.
A Bronx native, Sircar is the seventh Bronx Science student since 1993 to win an Intel award.