Cimarron-Memorial junior wins science trip

      Willy Wonka punished children for their curiosity about chocolate, but Paige Nelson's hot idea for a Hershey's bar landed her a trip to this year's International Science and Engineering Fair.
      The Cimarron-Memorial junior melted the brand-named chocolate bar in a microwave oven earlier this semester. Then Nelson applied the data she obtained to a complex physics formula to prove that microwave rays travel at the speed of light.
      The results were sweet success for Nelson, whose experiment went on to triumph as the best science experiment in Southern Nevada.
      The 16-year-old will travel to Louisville, Ky., next month to compete against student finalists from all 50 states and 40 foreign nations. The judges will include 10 Nobel Prize winners.
      The chocolate idea actually was a take-off of an experiment Nelson's teacher showed the class earlier in the year. In physics teacher Robert Stauffer Jr.'s project, he explained how a scientist could prove the speed-of-light theory by melting a marshmallow.
      "I just took it a step farther, using Hershey's instead," Nelson said. "The judges at the science fair said they'd never seen anything like it before."
      Far from being alarmed by copyright infringement issues, the folks at Hershey Foods Corp. went along willingly with the experiment.
      Nelson wrote the company a note using electronic mail early on to obtain important data about the melting point of their chocolate bar, a pivotal piece of information for her effort.
      When she won the Southern Nevada tournament, the candy giant sent her a citation congratulating her.
      Nelson's no stranger to success. She has the best grade-point average in her class and is captain of the cross country team. She owns the 6-year-old school's record for one- and two-mile runs, too.