Students at four Laois schools have travelled to the RDS in Dublin to compete at this year's Stripe Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition.

Students attending Heywood CS in Ballinakill, Mountrath CS, Dunamase College / Coláiste Dhún Mhásc and St Mary's CBS Portlaoise have qualified as finalists with their fantastic studies.

Over 500 finalists will take to the RDS from Wednesday January 7 to Saturday 10, showcasing their studies and battling it out in different categories.

Laois students have poured a tremendous amount of effort into their projects this past year. While studies vary greatly in topic, they each prove to be fascinating experiments.

Three studies from Heywood CS have qualified for this year's exhibition.

Third year students Zuzana Janockova and Luke Connolly's study in the Health and Wellbeing category's intermediate group is on the importance of the EU regulation on makeup products.

This study compares make-up goods inside of the EU to makeup goods outside of the EU, in accordance with regulations on cosmetic products.

Second year students Aoibhinn Malone and Síona Lalor's study in the Social and Behavioral Sciences category explores taste familiarity and visual recognition accuracy of fruits and vegetables in children aged 8-12 years.

Aoibhinn and Síona have studied the correlation between prior exposure and visual recognition accuracy of fruit and vegetables in children, if familiarity predicts taste acceptance.

Transition Year students Ashling Gonzalez and Elle Donovan's study in this category's intermediate group studies the link between the age joining social media, screen time and beauty influencer exposure. Ashling and Elle examined whether when young girls get their first social media account, if algorithms increase their exposure to said toxic influencers.

Mountrath CS have also undertaken a study reflecting the potential harms of social media.

Their qualifying intermediate project in the Social and Behavioral Sciences category examines whether potentially harmful parenting practices are normalised in kid-influencing industries. This individual project is a content-end audience-perception study.

Dunamase College have seen two of their projects qualify for the exhibition.

Three Transition Year students, Melissa Barcoe, Leo Bennett and Cian Bonnie, will present a project investigating whether the mineral content of mains and well water affects taste to such an extent that families spend between €800 and €3,000 annually on bottled water.

Their research explores the relationship between water quality, taste perception and consumer behaviour, raising important economic and environmental considerations.

Fifth-year student Angela Babikanga has also been selected for the exhibition with her project examining the mentality behind overconsumption among young people.

St Mary's CBS in Portlaoise Sixth year student Joshua Corbett returns as a finalist in the Chemical, Physical and Mathematical Sciences category.

Joshua's individual senior project is entitled 'There's plenty of room to break through at the bottom'.

Joshua has found that nanocarrier therapies fail in preclinical testing. He has developed an AI driven pipeline that can identify failure causes and optimise formulations to enhance brain drug delivery.

In 2025, it was announced that the Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition would be taken over by Mr Patrick Collison, co-founder of Stripe and former YSE winner.

A judging panel of experts from science, technology, and business will select over 200 prize winners, including the overall winner, who will take home €7,500 in prize money and represent Ireland in the EU Contest for Young Scientists (EUCYS).

For more updates on Laois schools at the Stripe Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition, keep an eye on the Leinster Express / Laois Live homepage.

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