STUDENTS from Penistone Grammar School have shown they have a head for science by engineering their way to a national competition. Four year nine pupils were due to present their safety helmet design at a Royal Society science fair in London today. The school’s Solar Flares team is made up of 13-year-old Daniel Walters and 14-year-olds Thomas Rolls (pictured), Joseph Moorhouse and Joseph Grant. They have designed and manufactured a prototype helmet suitable for the driver of a solar-powered car made by Durham University ahead of the World Solar Race Challenge taking place in Australia later this year. Forty Penistone Grammar pupils took part in an Engineering a Better World project, co-ordinated by Sheffield Hallam University, and four were selected to represent Yorkshire and Humberside at the BA CREST Science Fair. As part of their research, the Solar Flares team met senior radiographer Gerard Novak at Barnsley Hospital's X-ray department to find out about the importance of head gear for avoiding injuries. “This has been an excellent opportunity to encourage and nurture an interest in science with the students,” he said. Esther Parnham, the school's community learning manager, added that the students had spent hours working on the project after school. The budding scientists will have the chance to win cash prizes for their science department when they present the project to a panel of judges.