Bellarmine Senior Named Regeneron Science Talent Search Finalist for AI Security Research | Post Details Bellarmine Senior Named Regeneron Science Talent Search Finalist for AI Security Research Bellarmine Senior Named Regeneron Science Talent Search Finalist for AI Security Research Selena Pistoresi Jan 29 2026 12 00 AM Bellarmine senior Kevin Lu ’26 has been named a 2026 Regeneron Science Talent Search Finalist: one of the nation’s highest honors for high school researchers! Kevin’s project, AEGIS, tackles one of the most urgent challenges in emerging technology: defending AI systems from prompt injection attacks. In Kevin’s words: “AEGIS helps websites and applications defend against prompt injection attacks. It quarantines untrusted information and scans inputs for traces of an attack. AEGIS prevents prompt injections while being more effective and efficient than existing solutions.” In testing, AEGIS achieved a 0% attack success rate – And Kevin did all this on his own, without a mentor! He spoke about the challenge of doing fully independent research: “Approaching independent research was daunting at first… I annotated at least 50–100 papers, reproduced around a dozen, and emailed authors with questions. But the experience taught me resilience and helped me figure out who I want to become.” Kevin now explores AI risk from both a technical and policy lens, drawing on his background as a state champion policy debater and his internship at CivAI. We are incredibly proud of Kevin and his remarkable achievement!