The Yazzie Family

For the past five years the Yazzie family have been living in a mobile home that has no running water or heat, and only half the trailer with functioning electricity. Seeing that his family's mobile home had no heat, at 13 years of age, son Garrett tapped his scientific intuition to create a solar heater and a water heater. To create these, he used recycled materials, including an old car transmission and 69 aluminum cans, combining them with power generated from the sun. Garrett's makeshift heating system followed the Navajo principles of living off the land, not wasting anything and recycling everything that the earth has to offer. For his invention, he became the first Navajo to win 9 out of the 10 Discovery Channel Young Scientist Awards