A School of Dreams Academy STEM team won the 2022 New Mexico Governor’s STEM Challenge.
The team’s research was looking at how common chemicals used in various products impact the environment by contaminating water sources, and, in some cases, find their way into human bodies.
The team created a working prototype used a pH probe to determine when common chemicals were poured into a drain, then diverting the contaminated liquid into a holding tank 100 percent of the time.
“The hypothesis for this engineering design was if a pH probe indicator was coded and placed into the drainage pipes of a sink system, then a valve will be signaled to close when a pH is indicated (of less than or equal to) 7, rerouting the acidic liquids,” SODA STEM teacher Jennifer Nilvo wrote in a release.
The winning team engineered the prototype using an Arduino, a hardware development board, to code the…
