Anna Midgley

* Having a planet, even a minor one, named after you, is probably the last thing on any teenager’s mind. Yet, Anna Midgley, 17, a Herschel Girls’ High pupil, has just been informed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) Lincoln Laboratory that they have named a minor planet in her honour as recognition for being a top award winner in the 2015 Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, held in Pittsburgh. Anna, who is now in Grade 11, won the prize for her Grade 9 Science project, High Protein Fynbos Nuts: A New Superfood, competing against more than 1 600 students from 70 countries. Anna received the news of her planet this week in a letter from the head of the Aerospace Division of the MIT. Enclosed was a certificate identifying her planet, called (31935) Midgley, an orbital plot showing the location of her planet and instructions on how she may keep track of it.