A Bay Area teen is getting national recognition for an invention that could eventually lead to a cure for cancer.
Cupertino's Angela Zhang won the Siemens Competition in Math, Science and Technology on Monday. The 17-year-old created a nanoparticle that delivers chemotherapy directly to cancer cells. It can be triggered to release drugs at the site of the tumor.
One judge in the competition, a professor at UC San Francisco, told the Mercury News, "Her work is an important step in developing new approaches to the therapeutic targeting of tumors via nanotechnology."
The Monta Vista High School senior received a $100,000 scholarship with the grand prize.
"This is a Cinderella moment for a science nerd like me," Zhang told the Merc.
A peninsula team made up of Jeffrey Ling of Palo Alto High and Helen Jiang of Gunn High won a $10,000 scholarship in the bioengineering team competition.
