May 08, 2019 - Atlanta, GA
As the blockbuster movie "Avengers: Endgame" hit the theaters on April 25, Atlanta high school students just completed unraveling the codes of an escape room in Georgia Tech. The students have been taking the Georgia Tech distance-learning organic chemistry course taught by William Baron.
An escape room is a physical adventure with players solving a series of puzzles and completing tasks by using clues and hints to solve the stated objectives. Escape rooms often involve teams, locks, and keys. They have become popular because they allow participants to test their knowledge against time.
Student assistants Akhil Upad and Amitej Venapally, both third-year biochemistry majors, created the escape room for the organic chemistry course.
In this escape room story, the high-school students find themselves 100 years in the future. A super virus threatens to eradicate humanity. The students must find the mystery molecule that will wipe out the virus in just 55 minutes.
In the accompanying video, the story has morphed into one of superheroes, with characters making up the "Chemistry Avengers."
The "Chemistry Avengers" are from five Atlanta high schools:
Gwinnett School of Mathematics, Science & Technology
- Zachary Mailliard
- Jun Ho Yoon
Milton High School
- Maxwell Guo
- Kalid Mohammed
North View High School
- Shreya Dhupam
- Athrey Gonella
- Lawrence He
- Sylvia Tang
South Forsyth High School
- Madalene Henggeler
- Sweta Munagapati
Wheeler High School
- Brian Kent
- Pranav Nedumpurath
- Anish Panchumarthy