Fred, from Brighouse, West Yorkshire, spent a year and £400 building the polymerase chain reaction machine, one component of which was an old video player he found at home. He got the idea after reading about a similar one built by a man in America. Fred describes the device, which would cost £3,000 to buy new, as a 'DNA photocopier'. It amplifies the DNA strands so they can be analysed in a lab.
Fred will now go to Oxford University to study biochemistry