For the sixth year, The Lemelson Foundation is giving $100 awards to outstanding young inventors in Society Affiliated Fairs with middle school participants around the country. The prize was created to reward young inventors whose projects exemplify the ideals of inventive thinking by identifying challenges in their communities and creating solutions that will improve lives.

Milo Matsuda and Isabella York were both in the sixth grade at Pioneer Middle School in Shelton, Wash. when their teacher came to class with a problem to solve: Taylor Shellfish Farms, a locally owned business, had lost a lot of oysters in the heat blob of 2021. Record-breaking temperatures in Puget Sound, a large estuarine system in the northwestern United States, led to mass oyster die-offs, due to the overheating and exposure during low tide. Milo and Isabella sought to develop a solution to protect oysters from rising temperatures, ensuring their survival and supporting both the local economy and marine ecosystems. Both students noted that oysters are ecological powerhouses. They filter toxins from water, provide habitats for marine life, and prevent coastal erosion.

“I was very interested in this topic because we were doing research that was relevant to our community and I felt the research was very important,” Milo shared. Isabella added, “Locally, Taylor Shellfish employs over 500 people in Washington State.”

Milo and Isabella were honored with the Lemelson Early Inventor Prize at the Discovery Regional Science and Engineering Fair for a project they conducted in seventh grade, which was their second year spent researching oyster cages. “In the first year of our research we tried to solve this problem using a natural resource,” said Isabella. The two used biofouling as insulation and although the method was successful, the team decided it wasn’t the best solution because the insulation was dependent on variables outside of their control. In the second year of their work, the team designed a cage using reflective insulation, mesh and wood. Their research focused on how insulation could protect oysters from extreme heat, specifically by using reflective insulation to keep the oysters cool during temperature spikes.

Milo explained that they put HOBO MX temperature and light monitors in the cage to collect data for the project. “Then we put four oysters in each cage and then sealed them up and nailed them with rebar onto the beach,” Milo said. Each row had a control and an experimental cage. The team put their cages in Little Skookum Inlet, a branch of the Puget Sound known for its shellfish beds. Milo explained, “The Little Skookum shellfish growers generously gave us access to their beach.”

After a few months, Milo and Isabella downloaded the data and learned that using reflective insulation to protect oysters is a viable option for keeping them safe. The team found that the temperature in their custom cage was lower than the temperature of a standard oyster cage.

For their cage to be used in the future more research would need to be done, according to Isabella. The insulation on the cages had deteriorated during the experiment; water-proof insulation would need to be designed, or the cage would need to be re-designed with internal insulation. “I do think that fisheries can use our research to inform new cage designs,” Isabella said.

Milo said that the most interesting thing he learned while working on this project was that “you can never stop improving your invention because it can always be better.”

“The recognition of winning the Lemelson prize meant that the work we put in on designing and testing paid off and that we did a great job with our project,” said Milo. Isabella shared, “Receiving the Lemelson Early Inventor Prize recognizes that our invention has merit and that engineering a new oyster cage may solve a problem caused by climate change. This is important because it is a solution that uses climate adaptation. Our world is getting hotter, and climate adaptation is becoming vital.”