Young Scientists Form Award-Winning Partnership

Newtown Middle School students Jenna Ebert and Kaitlin Woodard took first place in the Junior Team Biological Division for their project “Mummification — Does the Type of Cloth Used Affect the Condition of the Mummy?” at the recent Science Horizons Fair and Symposium at Danbury High School.

Science Horizons, Inc is a Danbury-based independent nonprofit organization that aims to foster educational partnerships between local schools and industrial corporations.

Both Jenna and Kaitlin are new to the Newtown Public School system this year. The girls met during their first week of school and quickly became inseparable. This past fall, they also found out that they were distant cousins, as both of their families are related to the founder of Lyman Orchards in Middlefield.

Both academically accomplished students, the girls decided to team together to participate in this year’s Science Horizons competition. The girls’ interest in anthropology developed recently after studying Egyptian and Asian mummies, particularly the famous Chinese mummy Lady Dai of the Western Han dynasty (206 BC–24 AD), discovered in Changsha, China in 1971. Jenna even had the opportunity to visit the museum in China a few years ago where Lady Dai now rests!

The girls spent 65 hours researching their mummification project. To determine how different types of wrapping affected the physical condition of the body, the girls mummified three store-bought chickens with three different types of fabrics; muslin, silk, and green tea-soaked cheesecloth. Next, the students made three sarcophaguses, lining them with heavy fabric and placing a chicken in each. After sealing each box tightly, the chickens were buried in three four-foot holes for ten weeks.

Though they had hypothesized that the strong muslin fabric would preserve the bodies best, Jenna and Kaitlin found that the tea-soaked cheesecloth left the remains most impressively intact. This was because of the powerful, preserving antioxidants found in green tea. In addition to containing a high concentration of nutrients, antioxidants inhibit the oxidation process. This component of the tea’s organic chemistry slowed the chickens’ rate of decomposition.

Jenna and Kaitlin recently competed in the Connecticut State Science Fair at Quinnipiac University in Hamden. The girls’ success at the Science Horizons Fair & Symposium also qualified their entry in the Discovery Channel Young Scientist Challenge, a national competition in which top science students are recognized for their achievements in a special presentation in Washington, D.C. The girls also received the Schlumberger-Doll Research Award on behalf of the Ridgefield-based Schlumberger Limited Division of Research. Schlumberger Limited is a leading oilfield services company supplying technology, project management, and information solutions for customers working in the international oil and gas industry.

For more information on the Science Horizons Fair & Symposium, visit www.ScienceHorizons.org.