Team Facts & News
From 1986 to 2015, the United States Teams have brought home: 56 Gold Medals, 38 Silver Medals, 29 Bronze Medals, and 11 Honorable Mentions. — AAPT.ORG

Meet the Team
Contact Information
For more details and information about the US Physics Team, please contact AAPT's Programs department at 301-209-3340 or programs@aapt.org

Yogeshwar Velingker
Allentown, PA
Parkland School District
Grade: Junior
Hobbies
Hiking, playing badminton, classical music, playing violin, learning about different cultures and languages of the world
Clubs
Math League Club (Currently President), History Day Club, Scholastic Scrimmage Club, and Science Fair Club
Experience
National Honor Society, Math Honor Society, French Honor Society; Candidate for National Merit Scholarship; Team Semifinalist in the 2015 Siemens Science Competition. Research paper titled “Machine Learning Algorithms for Reliable and Efficient Identification of Cancerous Protein Kinase Mutations”; Mathematics Olympiad- USAJMO Qualifier (2012, 2013, and 2014), USAMO Qualifier (2015 and 2016); Physics Olympiad- Silver Medalist in USAPhO Semifinals (2015); Chemistry Olympiad- National Honor Roll (2015); Computing Olympiad (Gold division in 2015, Platinum division in 2016); National Le Grand Concours French competition (Silver award in 2015); ARML (Member of Lehigh Valley ARML Fire team); Da Vinci Science Center Student Excellence Award; State winner of MathCounts (2012 and 2013)
Bio
I am a junior at Parkland High School in the Allentown, PA area. Brought up in a suburb of Allentown, I have enjoyed nature and hiking in the nearby woods and parks. I remember spending hours watching birds and squirrels to my heart's content as a child, and in the process, I learned to appreciate biological and environmental sciences. Since childhood, I have been also fascinated by the beauty and the purity of mathematics. During my second grade, I came upon Raymond Smullyan's book The Riddle of Scheherazade: And Other Amazing Puzzles, and instantly fell in in love with it. The puzzles in the book made me think logically before arriving at solutions. Subsequently, I borrowed Smullyan's other books from the public library, and relished them as well. These books, written in an entertaining style, have provided a solid basis for my mathematical journey. Armed with tools of deductive and inductive reasoning, I started exploring advanced topics, particularly proof-based algebra and geometry while I was still in the elementary school. The spirit of exploring something new lives within me to this date. For any hypothesis, I have always sought either logical proofs or answers through experimentation.
Though, like any other child, I reveled in tinkering with toys and carrying out my own experimentation with tops, gyroscopes, lenses, magnets, and motors, my formal introduction to physics came when I took AP Physics C Mechanics with Mr. Sean Flueso during the freshman year of my high school. Instantly I realized that physics provides a foundation for other complex sciences such as chemistry, material science, and biology. The thought kindled my desire to study advanced topics in physics and quantum computing. Mr. Flueso, who has been a constant source of inspiration for me, has been encouraging and supportive of my efforts beyond school curriculum. My career aspirations are to solve some of the daunting problems we face, and make this world a better place than the one we inherited. Specifically my interests lie in pursuing interdisciplinary research involving mathematics, computer algorithms, and physics.
In high school, I have had fun spiritedly competing in various Olympiads, competitions, and science fairs. Because of these events, I have had exposure to academic areas beyond the high school curriculum. At these events, I have made very good friends, some of whom will be, I hope, my collaborators in solving complex problems. I am sure Physics Olympiad camp will be an enriching experience for me, and I look forward to meeting some great minds there.
Disclaimer: Information in Physics Team profiles is provided by the Team members and is in no way a reflection of AAPT's opinions or views.
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