Gitanjali Rao, a seventh grader from Colorado, has been awarded the title of "America's top young scientist" for designing a compact device to detect lead in drinking water, which she believes can be faster and cheaper than other current methods.

The 11-year-old's invention was inspired by the water crisis in Flint, Michigan, where cost-cutting measures led to tainted drinking water that contained lead and other toxins.
It also won her a $25,000 prize, for which Rao already has plans: "I plan to use most of it in developing my device further so that it can be commercially available soon," she told CNN.
Lead is a toxic metal that is harmful to humans even in very low concentrations. If ingested, it is particularly dangerous for children and can cause developmental problems. It usually finds its way into the water system as a result of corrosion of old leaded pipes, made before we knew it was toxic.
The seventh-grader, who attends the STEM School in Highlands Ranch, Colorado, originally submitted the idea to the Discovery Education 3M Young Scientist Challenge, an annual youth science and engineering competition for middle school students in the US, inaugurated in 2008. She was awarded a 3-month mentorship with Kathleen Shafer, a research specialist who develops new plastics technologies: "Gitanjali's concept was at a very early stage at the beginning of our mentorship. She had thought of this idea earlier this year, only a few weeks before the submission deadline," Shafer told CNN.

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