On Tuesday, June 5th, 2018 Suffolk County Legislator Bridget Fleming honored Elizabeth Sultan, a Brookhaven National Science Fair winner from Westhampton Beach Elementary School, by presenting her with a proclamation in front of colleagues and constituents, family and teachers, commemorating her hard work and spirit of curiosity.
Over 100 Suffolk County schools take part every year in BNL's Elementary School Science Fair. Some 470 projects, created by over 500 Suffolk County children ranging from kindergarten to 6th grade, compete. Elizabeth, who has been playing the piano for the past 3 years, won in the Third Grade category for her experiment testing how the human body reacts to different types of music, because she believes that different types of music move the heart. Elizabeth hypothesized that slow scales would decrease the heart rate and that more exciting music would increase the heart rate in her subjects.
Elizabeth discovered that music does move the heart. “Slow and boring music”, such as scales, can slow the heart rate, and faster exciting music, such as “Vivace”, increases the heart rate. She concluded that her findings could be useful for real world applications, because if you want to get excited for a pep rally you should listen to fast and exciting music, but if you are nervous about a test, you could calm down and relax yourself by listening to slow, music that lowers your heart rate.
"I am impressed by the spirit of curiosity and the ingenuity that Elizabeth brought to this experiment. She is an incredibly smart and talented young girl who has a bright future ahead of her. I am proud to have her in my district and want to congratulate her for her hard work and creativity in her successful science experiment, and I would like to thank BNL for providing this opportunity for Elizabeth, and for students across the county.” said Legislator Bridget Fleming.
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