Student Spotlight: Julianne Luna

Julianne Luna turned her curiosity for clean water innovation into the top placing project at the Fresno County Science Fair, and it focused on a bio absorbent used for selective removal of pollution in contaminated water sources.

This Sanger High junior has been involved in science fairs since the sixth grade. “Science has been very beneficial for me,” Luna said, when asked about her experience.

For Luna, the Fresno County Science Fair has always been less about a project and more about a creative outlet, where curiosity turns into research, and ideas start becoming environmental solutions.

This year, with the added boost of an F3i Ignition Grant, her work took a major step forward. Her project focuses on the growing environmental challenge of addressing surface and groundwater systems contamination from heavy metals, excess nutrients, and other hazardous pollutants, by developing a more sustainable and targeted method of removal.

It’s a refinement of last year’s work, making it more precise, efficient, and closer to real-world application. It’s also a personal mission for Luna. “This is directly associated with our community. We all need fresh, clean water, every day,” she said.

And while we’d love to share more information here, Luna is still actively in competition.

Luna has also noticed her own personal and professional growth, noting better interview skills and better creativity – both things that have provided her an “outlet for all the ideas I want to show off,” she said.

That outlet became a direction. After high school, Luna plans to study environmental engineering, continuing her focus on solving real environmental challenges through research and innovation.

Her project, Functionalized Bio-composite Sorbent: Novel Core-Shell Beads with Encapsulated Functionalized Biochar Engineered for Selective Chemical Removal of Waterborne Contaminants, is advancing to the Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) in Phoenix, Arizona, from May 9-15, 2026.

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This article originally published in the F3i Insights newsletter, May 2026 edition. Click here to subscribe.