《TAIPEI TIMES》 Teenager wins two awards at science fair held in Brazil

INTERNATIONAL EVENT: Chang Yu-yi won an award in the physics category and another for a study into the link between ventilation and combustion in fires

/ Staff writer, with CNA

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A Taiwanese teenager has won two awards at a science fair in Brazil, the National Taiwan Science Education Center said on Sunday.

The awards were announced last week at the Mostratec international science and technology fair held in Novo Hamburgo.

Chang Yu-yi （張又懿）, a 17-year-old homeschooled student from Taoyuan, won first place in the “Planetary and Earth Sciences and Mathematics and Physics” category and a Casio special award for her study, “Don’t Dance Inside the House: The Most Safety [sic] Building Against Fire and Smoke.”

Citing statistics, Chang said indoor fires account for a majority of fire accidents in Taiwan, and are often made worse by poor structural design and people opening windows or doors during a fire.

She studied the relationship between combustion, and the number and size of window and door openings by using thermodynamics, fluid mechanics and theory of structures.

Applying the principles of the stack effect and countercurrent smoke layer effect, she conducted an experiment with acrylic boards to simulate an indoor fire, while examining changes in the density of smoke as well as the height and temperature of the blaze.

The study showed that having more door and window openings did not weaken the fire as widely believed, Chang said.

Instead, the influx of oxygen from the outside caused the fire to become more intense, she said.

Chang’s study previously won second place at the Taiwan International Science Fair earlier this year, before being selected to represent Taiwan at the Mostratec event.

新聞來源：TAIPEI TIMES