JSHS Categories of Competition

Student presenters must state on the abstract form the category of their research. These are consistent with the six (6) major disciplines in which military sponsored scholarship awards will be made at the National JSHS competition:

• Environmental science; Earth and Space Science
• Engineering
  
• Physical Sciences, including chemistry, physics, and astronomy
  
• Life sciences
  
• Medicine and Health; Behavioral and Social Sciences
  
• Mathematics and Computer Science

The categories are further defined to assist students in choosing categories of competition and to better align judges in the proper sessions, but are not exclusive. These are listed below:

1. Environmental science; Earth and Space Science

Earth and space
Climatology, meteorology
Geochemistry
Geophysics
Planetary science
Tectonics

Environmental science
Environmental analysis-Pollution (air, soil, water)
Environmental management, including bioremediation, ecosystems, land resource management, recycling, waste management)

2. Engineering

Aerospace and aeronautical engineering
Bioengineering (consider Medicine & Health)
Chemical engineering
Civil engineering
Electrical engineering (consider Mathematics and computer science)
Energy (consider multiple categories dependent upon research question)
Industrial engineering
Materials engineering (consider Physical sciences—chemistry)
Robotics
Software engineering

3. Physical Sciences, including chemistry, physics, and astronomy

Physics and astronomy
Astronomy
Physics-solid state, acoustics, electromagnetics, optics, particle, nuclear, atomic, plasma, superconductivity, fluid and gas
Theoretical physics, Theoretical or computational astronomy

Chemistry
Analytical chemistry
Inorganic chemistry
Organic chemistry (other than biochemistry)
Physical chemistry
Chemistry-materials, plastics, fuels,metallurgy

4. Mathematics and computer science

Mathematics
Mathematics-theoretical
Mathematics-applied
Probability and statistics

Computer science
Algorithms, databases
Artificial intelligence
Networking and communications
Software engineering
Computer systems

5. Medicine and health/Behavioral sciences (includes study of diseases, pharmacology, physiology, pathology)

Medicine & Health
Diseases, study of and molecular biology of diseases
Epidemiology
Genetics
Physiology, pathophysiology
Pharmacology

Biochemistry
General biochemistry
Chemistry of life processes – metabolism, molecular biology, molecular genetics, enzymes, blood chemistry, protein chemistry, food chemistry, hormones

Behavioral sciences
Cognitive psychology
Developmental psychology
Physiological psychology
Sociology

6. Life sciences, including general biology (i.e. animal sciences, plant sciences, ecology) and molecular/cellular, biochemistry, genetics)

Biochemistry—Structural biochemistry
Microbiology – biology of microorganisms – bacteriology, virology, protozology, fungi, bacterial, genetics, yeast
Molecular/cellular—including genetics, immunology

General biology
Animal science (developmental biology, ecology, genetics, pathology, physiology)
Plant science (developmental, ecology, genetics, photosynthesis, plant physiology)
Pollution and impact upon ecosystems

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Related Links

High School Programs

CESAME (Center for Science & Mathematics Education)

JSHS (Junior Science & Humanities Symposium)