Marianne O'Shea, Catherine Stanton and Rosaleen Devery of Fermoy, Co Cork, won the annual Walsh Fellowship Award, worth £500, with their paper about a powerful anti-carcinogen found in cow milk fat.
The award, named after the late Dr Tom Walsh, the first director of An Foras Taluntais (now called Teagasc), encourages third-level students to undertake research and submit it for review. Fourteen of the best young university researchers presented their papers yesterday to a judging panel. The Royal Dublin Society and Irish Farmers' Journal awarded the prizes.