High school students have found that camera-integrated mobile phones are not only good for exchanging e-mail messages and snapshots but also for carrying out their school projects.

A six-student group from Horikawa High School in Kyoto received the first prize Monday in the Mobile Eco School Awards 2003 for their use of mobile phones to study the so-called heat island phenomenon. The awards are organized by Vodafone K.K., the Japanese unit of the British mobile phone service company.

The contest, held for the first time, is intended to make high school students think of ways to use their camera-equipped mobile phones for scientific and environmental studies. Six groups were finalists out of the 43 that entered the contest.

The Horikawa High School students simultaneously measured temperatures at several points of the city and used their mobile phones to send the data to a computer at their school.

After measuring the temperature, they moved to new observation points and repeated the procedures to find out where the temperature was the highest. They then took photos of clouds over the spot with the highest temperature to try to find a relationship between temperatures and clouds.

The heat-island phenomenon describes situations in which the temperature in a city center is higher than at its outskirts, causing high night-time temperatures and heavy rain over hot spots.

While Vodafone is using the contest to promote new ways to use mobile phones, some high school students called for telecommunication fees to be lowered so they can participate more readily in the contest.