About This Speaker: Fionn Ferriera
Fionn Ferriera is a young scientist, anti-plastic pollution campaigner and engineer. He is a native of West Cork, Ireland- a very remote region surrounded by the stunning Irish landscape.
As a child, Fionn enjoyed getting creative by inventing things using LEGO, little microcontrollers and wood. He put his creative skills to test upon hearing about microplastics. He searched frantically online for previous research into methods of removal of microplastics from water, only to learn that there was a lack of sources available. His passion on the topic led him to began his own research. His research led to the development of a non-harmful way to extract microplastics from water. Fionn developed a sustainable and effective method using simple ingredients- vegetable oil and rust powder. To test how efficient his invention was, he built his own equipment to test this using LEGO, wood and old electronics.
In 2019, Fionn was named the Grand Prize Global Winner of the Google Science Fair. Additionally, he was an award-winner at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair. The judging panel at the Google Science Fair admired his unique, outside-the-box approach to solve a real-world problem
Fionn’s work has been featured in media sources such as Forbes, Business Insider, National Geographic and CNN.
Currently, Fionn is studying Chemistry at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. He wishes to use his education to find and acquire new skills and tools to solve many more problems in the future. He is building a prototype for his extraction equipment, which he plans to implement in wastewater treatment and shipping in the future.
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