>>David Jones: We're going to start with you,
Harine. 17 years old. Passion for physics
and electrical engineering. Won the finalist
of the Google Science Fair and your whole
project, as we'll see a little video about,
is how you eliminate voltage fluctuations
in rural and remote areas of the world. And
you competed against 10,000 students from
91 countries to get to the finalist, and if
we could roll Harine's video, please.
[ Video playing ]
[ Applause ]
>>David Jones: So I met your mom in this feature,
and tell me a bit about your mom and how she
played a role in where she got to today.
>>Harine Ravichandiran: My mom's an electrical
engineer and she had her students come home
and she would teach them electrical engineering,
and I used to listen to them talk and after
they left, I used to ask her a million questions
and go on the net and surf. And that's the
way I understood what they were talking about.
That's how I got interested in electrical
engineering. And I learned MATHLAB from my
mom and she's the one who helped me do the
real-time implementation of my project.
>>David Jones: And talk a little bit more
about the project. Where did the idea for
that come from?
>>Harine Ravichandiran: When I was in (saying
name), voltage fluctuations were part and
parcel of life, and it was worse in the village
nearby. Like if -- we used to have power,
but it used to be very low. The fans used
to not work. The lights would not work.
And my grandparents were farmers. They used
to wake up at 3:00 in the morning just so
they could water their fields, and they used
to have stable power for just like one hour,
so they have to water all their fields within
one hour. So it was very tough.
And I was eight when I thought I could probably
put my MATHLAB knowledge and power electronics
knowledge together and find a solution to
it. I worked with MATHLAB and came up with
a regulator which could effectively compensate
all these fluctuations in less than .20 milliseconds,
and it could use locally available renewable
energy sources, so --
>>David Jones: That's an important point.
Talk about where the energy actually comes
from.
>>Harine Ravichandiran: In the villages of
India, we have lots of energy, like solar
energy and bioenergy like animal waste, but
they do not have stable voltage. So this voltage
regulator can use all those locally available
renewable energy sources and give them stable
voltage. So this can be used in all remote
areas of world and most developing countries.
[ Applause ]
>>David Jones: What's been the biggest obstacle
to getting to where you got to? What's been
the hardest thing?
>>Harine Ravichandiran: I'm a 16-year-old
girl meeting industries that I want to come
work with them and do the real-time implementation
of my design, so most of them, they're reluctant
to give me that opportunity and I got a lot
of "nos," and just one company accepted, and
I went there for the summer and I worked for
two months before I could build my regulator,
actually.
>>David Jones: Excellent. Well done.
[ Applause ]
>>David Jones: You'll be able to find out
how you can help these three at the end of
the session.
So next up is Am, who is the YouTube global
lab winner in the 17- to 18-year-old category.
Later this year he's going to become the first
Egyptian to send a science experiment into
space. He's 18 years old now, but what's probably
more remarkable about this is he did it all
through the height of the Egyptian revolution.
So if we could play the next video, please.
[ Video playing ]
[ Applause ]
>>David Jones: So most 18-year-olds are always
looking for an excuse to not study for A-levels,
and I would have thought, "Oh, look, mom and
dad, there's a revolution going on outside,
I can't work," would have been a pretty good
one. So talk to me about how it was and what
it was like actually doing that.
>>Amr Mohamed: When the revolution started
on the 25th of January, one day or two later,
all the schools were closed by order from
the military, and then -- I study in the A-level
system, so the A-level exams were not postponed.
And so at that time we started wondering whether
the situation in Egypt and the protests will
continue until the exams or not.
So there was a time of uncertainty where I
was really afraid that maybe I wouldn't be
able to finish my work and be ready for the
exam.
So I started working on my own, studying from
books or from when the Internet -- the Internet
was shut down several times during the revolution,
so whenever the Internet access is -- whenever
I had access to Internet, I used to watch
online lectures from universities.
>>David Jones: You said you had to go out
and actually, you know, march in the streets
and do various things. Talk to us a little
bit about that.
>>Amr Mohamed: Yeah. So I joined the protests
on the 28th of January, and policemen were
still in the streets, and so it was a very
intense day.
I walked with my friends to -- in a protest.
It was a large protest that was organized
this day.
And when we walked in Alexandria, we watched
the city hall, which was on fire, so we tried
to put down the fire, and two or three minutes
later, the guards, police guards, come and
we tried to tell them to come and help us
put down the fire, but they just stood there
silent.
And then all of a sudden, I'm teargassed and
I'm hearing gunfire shots and rage, so I just
went away with all my friends.
And then after we go away from the teargas
and the fire, we realized that we were missing
someone, so we go back and he's injured and
we try to fight off the police to get him
and arrive him to the hospital.
So -- and until then, for the 18 days of the
revolution, we used to go protesting every
day in protests all over Alexandria.
And also so with my study, I had to walk in
protests, and on the 28th, that day, the policemen
were withdrawn from the streets and the military
was deployed and there was news about murder
and theft and burglary, so we had to form
committees of young people who would patrol
the streets at night so that the people would
feel safe.
So in my neighborhood, you'd get assigned
like three or four hours of the night where
you must patrol the streets of the neighborhood
around the neighborhood, so on some days I
would stay late at night patrolling the streets
and then I'd still have to study for my A-levels
and still go and protest.
So it wasn't an intense time.
>>David Jones: And then from there to spiders,
spiders in space, do you want to just explain
where that comes from?
>>Amr Mohamed: Well, spiders have been in
space before. The kind of spiders that have
been in space before was the orb weavers.
It was featured in the famous children's book
"Charlotte's Web." So they have been in space
before, and what's really interesting is that
the webs they built in space were different
from the webs that are here. They were somehow
less dense and they were weaved in different
ways. So spiders could realize that they are
in zero gravity and they could adjust their
webs to the zero gravity environment.
So when I heard about the YouTube Space Lab
and I -- I read an article about the animals
that have been in space, I watched the video
of the orb weavers in space and I thought
that it would be really nice if we can make
things harder and take away a huge advantage,
which is their webs, and see if they can still
survive.
So I got the kind of spiders, they're jumping
spiders and they cannot weave a webs, and
they can do trajectory physics. We can measure
distances and adjust the angle that they jump
to land precisely on the prey.
So when they adjust the angle here on Earth,
they compensate for gravity. All they have
to do in space is realize that they don't
have to compensate for gravity anymore and
they just jump in a straight line.
So the -- there will be trial and error and
trial and error and --
>>David Jones: You said astronauts have a
harder time with this, you were saying earlier?
>>Amr Mohamed: Yes. Yes. I spoke to some astronauts
and some of them said that it would take them
three months to begin throwing things in a
straight line instead of throwing it with
an angle, so --
>>David Jones: So spiders will get there much
quicker?
>>Amr Mohamed: No. They're pushed by survival
or they won't last three months.
So the thing is, I suggested it would be trial
and error and trial and error until they realize
that they can jump -- only jump straight line,
and the amount of time it will take them to
realize this is a good measurement of how
developed their brains are.
>>David Jones: Excellent work. And Am got
into Stanford on the back of studying through
a revolution, so anybody whose kids give them
an excuse that they can't concentrate or focus,
a great example that you can. Well done.
[ Applause ]
>>David Jones: And last up is Joel, from a
rural village in Kenya, the winner of the
Zeitgeist Young Minds, and he has a fantastically
interesting social business idea which is
all about bringing water to communities in
his local village but can't actually get access
to water, but also making money out of doing
that.
So let's have a look at the video, please.
[ Video playing ]
[ Applause ]
>>David Jones: So great social business idea,
both making money and doing good.
What is your motivation? Where did it all
start?
>>Joel Mwale: I started Sky Drop in the year
2007. I fell ill of dysentery and I was taken
to hospital. And while I was in that hospital
bed yearning for strength and medication I
decided to ask myself that what if three,
four, five years down the line, the same thing
keeps on recurring. I probably might end up
dying out of dysentery. And so I told myself
when I recover, then I should do something.
So when I came from hospital, I built a manual
wheel-driven borehole for members of my community.
And six months down the line this borehole
was being used to deliver access to clean
drinking water to a population of 5,000 households.
Then that was how I started my passion into
water. And then two years down the line I
dropped out of high school because I could
not afford $100 school fees for a whole year.
And when I went back home, I started asking
myself, what can I do to be able to raise
money for school and money to sustain my family
because we were experiencing heavy financial
constraints. So I came up with an idea that
if I can be able to rent out someone's property
which had a concrete tank a processing plant,
then I can be able to look for money and buy
a purifying machine, then I can be able to
process this water, purify it and then sell
to the public at an affordable price.
So the first piece of the puzzle had been
solved. There was somebody who was willing
to rent out to me his property. But the other
thing was looking for capital, which growing
up in a rural Kenyan village, who will give
you $5,000 to buy a purifying machine.
So I went to the states for five months looking
for capital, but I wasn't able to get anything.
I mean, who will invest in a 16-year-old kid
saying that he wanted to start purifying water?
And so at the end of the day, I went back
home. I was quite frustrated, and in the midst
of frustration and about to give up I realized
that there was one thing that I had with me
and that was the fact that when my daddy died
in the year 2000, he left for us a 20-acre
piece of land. And this piece of land was
laying there bare, full of grass, and we couldn't
be able to cultivate it because we could not
afford the agricultural inputs. So I told
myself if you can be able to lease this piece
of land to somebody for a period of five years
and then ask this guy to give me $5,000, which
is out of 500,000, then he can use each year
that he tills the land to reclaim $1,000 for
that money. So after five years, the guy will
have recovered this loan, and he will have
given me in the meantime money to start the
business.
And so we went into negotiations, and after
one month down the line, I was able to get
$5,000 to buy a water purifying machine, and
we started processing water.
>>David Jones: And how many bottles are you
selling today?
>>Joel Mwale: By the end of last financial
year we were able to sell 200,000 bottles,
which represents a thousand percentage growth
as compared to the previous year.
[ Applause ]
>>David Jones: So Harine, a question to the
three of you. We hear a lot that your generation
can change the world. Can you?
>>Harine Ravichandiran: Yes, I think so, because
I find many people in my generation asking
questions. They don't accept things. They
question everything around them. And they're
so curious, they look for answers. They don't
-- they look for answers and they want to
go higher. They're like why can't I go there?
Why can't I do this? Why can't I do that.
So that questioning tendency I think will
take us a long way.
>>David Jones: Do you guys agree?
>>Amr Mohamed: Yes. Also we have the access
to technologies and Internet that I think
help me a lot during my studies and also helped
me send an experiment to space. In Egypt,
when you think about space exploration, it's
not an option because we have lots of other
things to do. So....
So when you think about that you want to contribute
to such an important field and you have access
to things that will help you to reach your
goal, we can get knowledge, you can get experience,
you can get advice all through the Internet.
>>David Jones: Joel, you agree?
>>Joel Mwale: I also believe that this generation
is the most important generation. I look at
this information that's available through
technology. And so we are -- we are a generation
that is empowered than any other generation.
And also the level of responsibility in our
generation I think is the highest because
I think if you look at how youths now, how
the youth are engaging themselves, people
stop saying that the government will do something.
So people are now taking initiatives to start
their own businesses, to be able to solve
challenges in communities.
So I think with this generation, we can be
able to do that.
>>David Jones: So you are looking at a room
of old people. What advice would you give
them?
>>Joel Mwale: Basically, I think my advice
to old people would be to --
[ Laughter ]
[ Applause ]
>>Joel Mwale: Well, to invest in youths, and
youths who are deep involved in entrepreneurship
because I believe that if you capitalize on
the youths and entrepreneurship, then it can
be able to create an amazing change in the
world.
You see people like Bill Gates. They started
at such a young age. People like (saying name).
If these old guys here can invest in youths
and buck up their entrepreneur activities,
then you can create an amazing change.
>>David Jones: Harine?
>>Harine Ravichandiran: Invest in terms of
funding, and I think time and mentorship.
I would love to learn from people who are
more advanced in the field of power electronics
or physics. That would be nice.
>>David Jones: Am?
>>Amr Mohamed: I agree with Joel that the
best investment is to invest in the youth
and science, and it's a long-term investment
but it's the best kind of investment because
investing in science and youth, it will lead
to the products that are going to change the
world. And I second Joel.
>>David Jones: And you have all come here.
You have a very important bunch of people
here. You obviously would like to get something
out of your trip to Google Zeitgeist. If each
of you had one tangible ask that if anybody
sitting here is motivated to come and help
you, what would that be? Joel?
>>Joel Mwale: Basically, as an entrepreneur
I am looking for people who can be able to
mentor me in my growth because a mentor will
understand that sometimes growing up as an
entrepreneur and getting to experience things
yourself, you are bound to make mistakes.
And I just incorporated Sky Drop into a company
and we are looking for people who can be able
to help me model it into a big colossal company
that possibly can be the next Nestle or Coca-Cola
of Africa.
And we also are looking for people who can
be able to help my business grow either way
through investment or through networking.
>>David Jones: Terrific. Harine?
>>Harine Ravichandiran: I would like to have
a mentor and somebody who would finally help
me do my project for the practical world.
Like right now I have done it for 20 worlds
and five worlds variation, but I have done
it to 20 worlds in MATHLAB which means I can
actually do it in real time. But I have not
done it for the lack of funding and a mentor.
So it would be great to get both of those.
>> David Jones: Am?
>>Amr Mohamed: I still think you should invest
and encourage in science and in the young
people. That's my request.
>>David Jones: Terrific. Well, I think three
amazing young people all going to Stanford
next year.
[ Applause ]
>>David Jones: They'll also be attending One
Young World in October this year, and anybody,
a quick plug, who is interested in getting
involved in One Young World, which is now
an official charity, track me down later.
We'd love your help and input as well.
So well done, guys. Thank you very much.
[ Applause ]
