Résumé — Nirav Surabhi

Nirav Surabhi

Software + mechanical engineering, from Civic aerodynamics to bias-reducing news apps.

Brambleton, VA niravsurabhi@gmail.com niravsurabhi.com linkedin.com/in/niravss github.com/21J3phy

Education

Purdue UniversityFALL 2026 · INCOMING

B.S. Mechanical Engineering

Independence High SchoolGRAD. JUN 2026

Loudoun County, VA · Senior

Coursework: AP Computer Science A, AP Physics C, Multivariable Calculus.

Central Virginia Governor's SchoolJUN–JUL 2024

Science & Technology · Mathematics scholar

Mechanical / Hardware

Passive Vortex Propulsion2024–2025 · 1ST AUTHOR

Started as an experiment to make my Honda Civic more efficient; built a wind tunnel from scratch, soldered & calibrated load cells with an Arduino, and ran CFD in Fusion 360. First demonstration of passive vortex propulsion in air — published first-author paper; AIAA award & NASA Goddard invitation.

Arduino · C++ · load cells · Fusion 360 · CFD · Python

FTC Robotics — Absolute Zero (12096)2022–2026 · CAPTAIN

Four years as captain & lead programmer; CADded and built every part in Fusion 360. Wrote autonomous & tele-op in Java — PID loops, sensor fusion, odometry. Reached the Chesapeake championship.

EV & Salinity SensorSCIENCE OLYMPIAD

Autonomous EV that accelerates then brakes to a target distance (Arduino, goBILDA motor, quadrature encoder, PID); Arduino salt-water salinity sensor reading conductivity.

Skills

Languages: Java, Python, JavaScript, TypeScript, HTML, CSS, Git
AI / ML: Prompt engineering, LLMs, CNNs, computer vision, agent architecture
Cloud: Fly.io, Vercel, Supabase, Fusion 360
Hardware: Arduino, load cells, soldering, multimeter, PID control

Honors & Music

AIAA Aerospace Award (RSEF special honor → NASA Goddard invitation)
Captain, Science Olympiad
Presidential Volunteer Service Award (Silver)
Central Virginia Governor's School for Science & Technology — Mathematics, 2024
1st place, Agaudo guitar competition · All-Virginia Guitar Ensemble

Software — Founder Projects

Khali2025–NOW · CO-FOUNDER/CEO

khali.info

TikTok-style swipe-through news startup built to make short-form scrolling useful: stories combine opposing sources, present one claim at a time, and include an OpenAI "ask this story" assistant. Native SwiftUI iOS + Expo/RN app on a Node + Python backend.

Swift/SwiftUI · React Native · Expo · Node.js · Python · OpenAI · Supabase

Articulator2026–NOW · INDYHAX 2026

articulator-3000.vercel.app

Turns a rough idea — spoken, typed, air-drawn over webcam (MediaPipe, client-side), or uploaded — into a structured model, interviews you until it understands, runs a web-research reality check, and emits briefs and a concept image. Hackathon project taken to production.

Next.js · TypeScript · OpenAI Responses API · MediaPipe · Supabase · Zod

Chad vs. Chud2026 · CO-FOUNDER/CEO · SUNSET

chadvschud.com

Real-time 1v1 webcam face-rating battle scored by an AI. Built the Next.js client, a Socket.IO/WebRTC matchmaking service, and a Python/FastAPI inference service (ResNet-18 + ArcFace + LLM scorer). 10,000+ users, 100+ concurrent.

Next.js · TypeScript · FastAPI · WebRTC · PyTorch · Supabase · Fly.io

b2alpha.io2026 · CO-FOUNDER/CEO · SUNSET

b2alpha.io

Open agent-to-agent protocol — secure messaging + DNS integration; prompt engineering for structured, parseable output. 2,000+ business users.

TypeScript · Node.js · OpenAI API · Vercel · Supabase · DNS

PredictionView2026 · CO-FOUNDER/CEO · SUNSET

predictionview.app

Full-stack Kalshi prediction-market trading hub — charts, an OpenAI analyst with web research, alerts, watchlists, a journal/backtester. Owned the Express + Prisma/Postgres backend (127 routes, cron jobs) and Vitest tests.

React · TypeScript · Vite · Express · Prisma · PostgreSQL · OpenAI

Experience

CAD InternJUN 2025–MAY 2026

I3 Simulations

3D models and haptic-feedback prototypes for medical-training simulators.

Bike MechanicJUN 2021–AUG 2025

The Bike Lane · intern → part-time

Built bikes from the frame up; ran final safety checks.

AI Engineer & SWE InternFEB 2021–2022

Ember Learning (formerly DeAP Learning Labs)

Wrote the LLM prompts behind AP-tutor chatbots; built automated AI grading for AP DBQs/FRQs against the official rubric; indexed lecture transcripts in a vector DB for timestamp search; led the company website. Team landed a Microsoft & OpenAI grant; $1M+ valuation.