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Get to know our Bright Future finalists, Aditya and Gwen

Bright Future Prize is all about empowering aspiring community leaders. To date, the annual prize has already invested over £185,000 in young people from around the world to help them make their bright ideas to do good a reality.

2026 marks Bright Future's fifth anniversary. Over this time the prize has evolved and grown, but as ever our shortlist of finalists each exemplify ambition and commitment to make a positive impact on the world around them.

In the lead up to revealing our winners, we are showcasing all eight of our finalists – representing Australia, Brazil, New Zealand, Portugal, Singapore, and the UK – to provide the opportunity to get to know more about their bright ideas and what drives their passion projects.

This week we hear from Aditya and Gwen who both take problem solving to the next level to make a positive difference to climate and disabled people respectively.

Harnessing robotics to protect water quality

Aditya Banerjee
Leiria, Portugal

Aditya is a problem solver on a mission to help communities better monitor and protect water quality. Combining his passion for technology and climate, his project, Rowbot, is a network of semi-autonomous robotic buoys which provide real-time data, including temperature, pH and pollution levels.

Currently there are very few water quality stations, which are often not connected and expensive to maintain. Through Rowbot, Aditya wants to create a broader and more integrated approach. By installing buoys that share data using an Open Access model, he hopes that communities can make more informed and ultimately better decisions to take action to protect their water.

Already, Aditya has prototyped his design and is now ready to create a full-scale, working model, alongside creating a platform to host the Global Water Dashboard which will host data collected. Ultimately, he dreams of continuing to pursue a career in environmental robotics – with the dream of making information on water quality visible and comparable across the world to enable large-scale action to protect waterways.

Water quality is like a black box right now, and what's necessary is bringing that information to light to help communities self-regulate and monitor water themselves. Rowbot brings real-time information about freshwater bodies to the people who need it most.
Aditya

Empowering independence through accessible cooking

Gwen Thornton
Essex, UK

Drawing on her passion for engineering technology and her own experience of disability, Gwen is determined to empower others to live independently.

Preparing meals is a task often taken for granted, but for some this presents a challenge with recipes not considering additional needs, whether that’s sensory tolerance, eyesight, physical ability, or neurodivergence.

This is why Gwen has developed Spoonfullness – an app with independent living at its core. Spoonfullness considers accessibility at every step, from its interface with adjustable fonts, colours and display options, recipe filters that take into account sensory needs, and cooking methods tailored to varying physical needs.

Gwen understands the immense difference being able to cook can have on agency and choice, and Spoonfulness takes on an essential part of daily life that can help many others care for themselves with confidence.

Having completed early-stage development and user testing, Spoonfullness is ready for further refinement and expansion before being released to even more people who would benefit.

I've always had an interest in building things, making things, solving problems. Especially problems other people aren't solving. Spoonfulness supports guided independence, rather than reliance. It supports learning skills, so you don't have to rely on someone else to meet your daily needs. Spoonfulness gives me the freedom to actually live a life.
Gwen

What happens next?

Over May, we'll continue to share more on our shortlist through our finalists showcase. Then, in June, our ACT Trustees will select the four winners, who will each win £10,000 to take their idea to that next stage and beyond.

Stay connected with Bright Future Prize and ACT

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