Want to charge your iPod battery without power? No problem, says Poorna Prajna Education Centre students Ajay and Chandrashekhar. Here’s what the young whizkids suggest: Take an onion and dip it in any energy drink for half an hour. Remove outer layer and open the vegetable a little bit with a knife and place the charging pin in the onion for half an hour. You can then use this charge to listen to music on the iPod, for a full 15 minutes. Electrolyte of the energy drink charge the iPod, explain the students.

This was one of the projects exhibited at the Young Inventors Meet jointly organised by Rotary Club of Bangalore, Bangalore Association for Science Education (BASE) and Jawaharlal Nehru Planetarium on Sunday. Roshini and Dinazz of Sishugriha Montessori had a project on generating power from solar energy and using the same for electrolysis of saline water. Solar panels are used for generation of power, which is stored in a solar power cell. With the help of power cell, saline water was subjected to electrolysis. Roshini is confident that her project method can be very useful to make sea water potable.

Treadmill
Prakhar Sinha and Dheeraj Varma of Nagarjuna Vidyanikethana had a model of a multi-purpose treadmill to show. As one walks on the treadmill, it can cut vegetables, generate power and wash clothes. As one walks, the wheels connected to it start rotating and in turn produce power and act as turbines in washing machine. Ironing clothes without power was the idea that struck Pranav T M and Sumukh K M of Poorna Prajna Education Centre in Yelahanka New Town. They had developed an economical iron box, which works on hot water drawn from solar water heater. The iron box comprised of a metallic base which could hold hot water. Heat experienced at the bottom surface due to hot water was enough to iron clothes. Once the water cooled, it could be supplied to a pump through an outlet.

As many as 46 projects from 14 schools were exhibited in the meet. Lal Bhatia of Rotary Club of Bangalore said among 46 projects 10 best projects will be exhibited at Rotary Club on Monday. Of them five best projects will be selected for cash award. Participants will get participation certificates, gift coupon and a memento.