UNCASVILLE, Conn. — Organizers wanted to make it clear the 99th Miss America competition isn’t your grandmother’s beauty pageant, and their winner did just that.

Virginia biochemist Camille Schrier, 24, won the crown Thursday night just minutes after wowing the crowd with science.

Dressed in a lab coat, she gave a colorful chemistry demonstration of the catalytic decomposition of hydrogen peroxide.

Schrier, a native of Pennsylvania, said she hopes to “break stereotypes about what it means to be a Miss America in 2020” by being a “woman of science” who is authentic to herself.

Victoria Hill of Georgia placed first runner-up.

No longer called contestants, the 51 women “candidates,” who hailed from all 50 states and the District of Columbia, competed for a $50,000 scholarship and the “job” of Miss America, a one-year paid position they hope to use as a public platform for their “social impact initiative.”

For the second year in a row, women were not judged in a swimsuit or how they look in an evening gown. Instead, a series of interviews and talent demonstrations determined who was best qualified to wear this year’s crown.

Schrier, who spoke on stage about having tackled an eating disorder, said she decided to compete for Miss America after the swimsuit competition was ditched, along with other changes that have been made to modernize the organization.

“I kind of figured that I would never get on that stage because I was a woman who did not want to get into a swimsuit on stage. And I didn’t have a performing talent, which is really ironic now,” she said, adding how she’s the first Miss America to win with a science experiment, a presentation she brings to schools.