UK project to reduce PFAS pollution is awarded Stockholm Junior Water Prize

27.8.2024 23:29:00 EEST | Business Wire | Press release

Christopher Whitfield and Wenqi (Jonathan) Zhao from the United Kingdom receive the prestigious Stockholm Junior Water Prize 2024 for their work on PFAS pollution in the Thames Basin. HRH Crown Princess Victoria of Sweden presented the winners with their award during a ceremony at World Water Week in Stockholm.

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) pollution is a growing concern worldwide. Focusing on the Thames Basin in the United Kingdom, where there are with no equitable solutions to the problem, Whitfield and Zhao developed a geospatial neural network, predicting PFAS values to within 10 percent of experimentally validated values.

For this, they were announced the winners of the Stockholm Junior Water Prize, an international competition where students between the ages of 15 and 20 present solutions to major water challenges.

Speaking on winning the prize, Zhao said, “We are very proud to have won this prize. It has been an amazing stay here in Sweden with so many new friends”.

The Jury noted that Whitfield and Zhao “find a way to take data and turn it into actionable knowledge. [They have] identified PFAS hotspots using machine learning, field tested their results, developed a cost-effective filtration system, and reached out to local governments and environmental organizations to raise awareness.”

The winners were presented with their prize during an award ceremony at World Water Week by HRH Crown Princess Victoria of Sweden, the Prize’s Official Patron.

The Diploma of Excellence was awarded to Shanni Valeria Mora Fajardo and Rosa Mendoza Sosa from Mexico for their work on how to reuse inked water with homemade filtration to produce veggie gardens.

The People’s Choice Award went to Manoel José Nunes Neto from Brazil, completing the line-up of winners.

The Stockholm Junior Water Prize has been organized every year since 1997. It is hosted by the Stockholm Water Foundation, with Xylem as Founding Partner.

“Innovation is paving the way to a more water-secure world, and the next generation are accelerating progress. The Stockholm Junior Water Prize competitors are an inspiring example of the ingenuity and passion young innovators bring to the table. On behalf of Xylem, I’d like to congratulate all those who took part in this year’s competition,” said Austin Alexander, Vice President of Sustainability and Social Impact at Xylem.

Read more about the winning projects:

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240827691002/en/

Contacts

Andreas Karlsson
Head of Communication, Stockholm International Water Institute
Email: andreas.karlsson@siwi.org, Mobile: +46 (0) 720 506078

About Business Wire

For more than 50 years, Business Wire has been the global leader in press release distribution and regulatory disclosure.

www.businesswire.com

Subscribe to releases from Business Wire

Subscribe to all the latest releases from Business Wire by registering your e-mail address below. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Latest releases from Business Wire

No-Loss Trading Platform UpsideOnly Surpasses 100,000 Users Within Weeks of Launch6.7.2026 15:48:00 EEST | Press release

Perpetuals.com Ltd (Nasdaq: PDC), today announced that UpsideOnly, its risk-free trading and market prediction platform, has seen a surge in new user sign-ups, surpassing the important milestone of 100,000 traders within weeks of its launch on May 19. UpsideOnly lets users make predictions about where global equity, commodity, forex, and crypto markets are heading without ever placing a real trade themselves. Perpetuals uses its own capital to trade on the strongest signals identified by its proprietary AI. If those trades win, Perpetuals shares the profits with the users who helped generate the signal. If the trade doesn’t make money, users lose nothing. Reaching 100,000 users so quickly after launching is a reflection of the enormous demand for a platform that flips the traditional retail trading model on its head, with early platform data showing strong engagement across asset classes, geographies and user activity: Users from more than 180 different countries $38.4 billion in cumul

Klarna Submits Application for U.S. Banking License6.7.2026 15:30:00 EEST | Press release

Klarna (NYSE: KLAR), the global digital bank and flexible payments provider, today announced it has submitted applications to the Utah Department of Financial Institutions and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) to establish Klarna Bank USA, a proposed Utah-chartered industrial bank. Klarna has operated as a licensed bank in Europe since 2017 and serves U.S. customers through valued partner banks. Since 2019, Klarna has provided Americans with access to over $91.3 billion in responsible credit, saving them more than $5.1 billion in interest compared to revolving credit card debt. Today, 30 million Americans use Klarna each year, and hundreds of thousands of merchants rely on Klarna to grow their businesses. "Banking is built on trust," said Sebastian Siemiatkowski, co-founder and CEO of Klarna. "We've seen firsthand the appetite for a fairer, more transparent approach in the U.S., and our own banking license is the natural next step, giving customers tools to borrow respon

IQM Quantum Computers Acquires Assets of Quantistry GmbH to Bridge the Gap Between Quantum Algorithms and Solutions for Industrial Enterprises6.7.2026 15:00:00 EEST | Press release

IQM Quantum Computers (Nasdaq: IQMX) (“IQM”, “IQM Quantum Computers” or the “Company”), a global leader in full-stack superconducting quantum computers, has acquired selected assets of Quantistry GmbH, a Berlin-based developer of cloud-native simulation workflow platform for automotive, aerospace, chemical, materials and pharmaceutical industries. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260706448170/en/ IQM Quantum Computers Acquires Assets of Quantistry GmbH to bridge the gap between Quantum Algorithms and Solutions for Industrial Enterprises The acquired assets include proprietary software applications, algorithms, and intellectual property. IQM will also retain Quantistry's core technical, quantum chemistry, and software engineering talent, ensuring seamless continuity and rapid platform integration. The transaction completed recently, concurrently with IQM's business combination with Real Asset Acquisition Corp. (

Agenus Reports Landmark BOT+BAL Data Showing 33% Three-Year Overall Survival in Refractory MSS Metastatic Colorectal Cancer Without Active Liver Metastases at ESMO GI 20266.7.2026 14:30:00 EEST | Press release

Agenus Inc. (Nasdaq: AGEN), a leader in immuno-oncology innovation, today announced three-year landmark Phase 1b data from the fully enrolled C-800-01 cohort evaluating botensilimab (BOT), an Fc-enhanced multifunctional anti–CTLA-4 antibody, plus balstilimab (BAL), an anti–PD-1 antibody, in patients with refractory microsatellite-stable (MSS) metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) without active liver metastases. The data were presented at the European Society for Medical Oncology Gastrointestinal Cancers (ESMO GI) Congress 2026 on July 2 in Munich, Germany. BOT+BAL demonstrated clinically meaningful long-term survival in a heavily pretreated patient population with historically limited benefit from conventional immune checkpoint inhibitors and few durable treatment options after progression on standard therapies. With extended follow-up, median overall survival was 21.2 months and the three-year overall survival rate was 33%, with the Kaplan-Meier curve showing a plateau beyond two years

LTM Launches BlueVerse™ RightLogic to Address Cyber Risk in AI Era6.7.2026 12:12:00 EEST | Press release

LTM, the Business Creativity partner to the world’s largest enterprises, has launched BlueVerse™ RightLogic, a cybersecurity assessment and risk assurance framework designed to help enterprises identify, assess and remediate cyber exposure as they accelerate AI adoption. AI is now capable of autonomously identifying and exploiting vulnerabilities, while exposure across infrastructure, applications and supply chains continue to expand. This has elevated cyber risk from a technology concern to a board-level priority, with enterprises struggling to maintain visibility and respond at the speed of emerging threats. BlueVerse RightLogic addresses this gap by providing a unified, business-aligned view of enterprise exposure and enabling a shift from fragmented, point-in-time assessments to continuous, evidence-led risk management. The framework combines an end-to-end AI and cyber exposure assessment engine with a structured execution model that spans from assessment to remediation. At the cor

In our pressroom you can read all our latest releases, find our press contacts, images, documents and other relevant information about us.

Visit our pressroom