The ICMS is holding a competition to raise awareness of the world of nanotechnology through literature in Andalusian high schools.
- The initiative is part of the X Festival of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology “10alamenos9” and will have a national and an international phase.
- The best “nano-story” in each age category will receive a prize of €200.
- Schools will be able to submit their proposals from 9 April to 12 May.
The Institute of Materials Sciences of Seville (ICMS), a joint centre of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and the University of Seville (US), together with the Isla de la Cartuja Research Centre (CicCartuja) and the CSIC Delegation in Andalusia and Extremadura have promoted a new edition of the nano-story competition, an initiative aimed at raising awareness of the world of nanotechnology through literature in schools throughout Andalusia.
This initiative, which has a national and an international phase, is part of the X Festival of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology “10 to minus 9” organised by various institutions, universities, foundations, companies and research centres. The aim is to ‘awaken the interest of the educational community in the nanoscale world, the so-called nanoworld, which despite its tiny size is very diverse and interesting’, according to the rules of the call published in Divulgación ICMS.
Those interested must send a proposal written in Spanish with a maximum length of 200 words and related to nanoscience and nanotechnology (information can be found on the Festival’s Youtube channel). In addition, the stories can be of any genre (adventure, science fiction, fantasy, social story, etc.), although they must be completely original, as they cannot be used in another competition or use artificial intelligence in their production.
Likewise, participants may be students from public, state-subsidised or private schools located in Andalusia and aged between 14 and 17 on 31 December 2024, i.e. those in the 3rd and 4th years of Compulsory Secondary Education (ESO), 1st and 2nd years of Baccalaureate, Basic Vocational Training and Intermediate Vocational Training. Thus, there will be two categories to compete: A (born between 2010 and 2009) and B (born between 2008 and 2007).
To enter the competition, those interested should send their proposal in the template in word or pdf format, together with the registration form to with the subject “Nano-story 2025” from 9 April to 12 May 2025. In addition, they will have to use a pseudonym and christen the document of their proposal as ‘Pseudonym-StartTitle’, where ‘StartTitle’ is the first ten characters of the beginning of the title of the work, without blank spaces.
In this regard, the CSIC recalls that all the works will remain in its possession and may be used for dissemination in different media, but their use will never be for profit and the authors of the selected stories, as well as their educational centres, will always be cited.
Two prizes of €200 each will be awarded by the ICMS and CicCartuja. In addition, several runners-up prizes will be awarded depending on the number of participants per category, as follows: from 22 stories received, one runner-up prize will be awarded for each block of up to 15 additional stories. Thus, if less than 22 stories are received in a category, only one prize will be awarded; between 23 and 37 stories received, one prize and one runner-up prize will be awarded; between 38 and 52 stories received, one prize and two runner-up prizes will be awarded, etc. The runners-up prizes will consist of two popular science books from the collection ‘What we know about…’ co-published by the CSIC and La Catarata. These gifts will also be given to the winning schools.
In the following links you can consult the rules as well as download the material referred to: