Lankan student tops inventors contest with novel funnel

Jayasiri Munasinghe

COLOMBO: Out of more than 1,000 competitors representing 35 countries who contested the International Inventions Competition in New Delhi, India, the entry presented by a Sri Lankan student has won the first place.

The winner of this international competition is Nayana Thumanga Rajapaksa, a maths student at Ananda College, Colombo.

The International Inventions Competition is conducted annually by the Inventions Promotion Institute of Japan.

This year the competition was held in New Delhi from February 13 to 16. The second place was won by China and the third place by India.

There were 10 competitors representing Sri Lanka. Nayana Thumanga Rajapaksa presented a novel funnel as his entry. The speciality in this funnel is its ability to change liquid from one bottle to another with ease and speed, without wasting a single drop.

Nayana's funnel is capable of closing its lid by itself automatically once the new bottle is completely filled, stated Dr.Preshantha Nanayakkara, the Commissioner of the Sri Lanka Inventors Commission.

The next competition will be held in 2008 in Indonesia, in 2009 in Nigeria and in 2010 in Sri Lanka.