US President praises Pranav Sivakumar for Being First Person to Be Global Finalist in Google Science Fair Twice

US presidents Barack Obama has always supported and appreciated outstanding work, and this time, the one who received appreciation from him is a 15-year-old boy. Obama lauded the budding Indian-American astronomy buff during the Astronomy Night organized by him on Monday.

Pranav is the first person to be a Global Finalist in Google Science Fair twice. During the event, president Obama said, “When Pranav Sivakumar was six years old, he found an encyclopedia about famous scientists lying around house. At least he thinks it was lying around there. Actually, his parents probably were setting it out hoping he was going to run into it”.

The US President further said that Pranav has been fascinated with outer space and every Saturday his parents drove him an hour to an astrophysics lab for ‘Ask-A-Scientist’ class.

And in no time he collaborated with researchers and started studying the ‘gravitational lensing of quasars’, which is a really big achievement at such a small age, Obama said.

Pranav, who is an eighth grader at the Illinois Math and Science Academy in Aurora, Illinois, is one among 20 teens from across the world to be named a finalist in Google's online science and technology competition.

He is also a proud holder of the Virgin Galactic Pioneer Award which he received last month for researching objects called quasars. Pranav is also a runner up in the 2013 National Spelling Bee.

The brilliant kid is presently working to find galaxies dominated by dark matter with a professor at the University of Chicago.