Hardik Viradiya comes to us from University of Dayton after growing up in Gujarat, India, where his family owns and oper­ates a busi­ness that makes bolts, rivets, and other fasteners. While completing his engineering degree in India, Hardik led a group of students in the design of a solar-electric vehicle, winning first place in an all-India championship event. He came to the United States last year to continue his study of mechanical engineering.
Hardik joins BDL through his university’s ETHOS program (Engineers in Technical Human­itarian Opportunities of Service-Learning), which pays all of his expenses while he earns credit towards his degree for his time with Burn Design Lab. 
During his 10 weeks at BDL, Hardik will improve our com­puter models of cookstove com­bustion and heat transfer. This will allow us to predict a cookstove’s performance before building it. The model results will always need to be confirmed by building and testing proto­types, but the new program will make the process significantly faster and allow us to simulate many more design options.

Ryan Hall joined the Burn Design Lab team this June— days after graduating from Cali­fornia State Polytechnic Univer­sity, Pomona with a bachelor’s degree in electro-mechanical systems engineer­ing. Having played for Cal Poly’s basketball team through most of his college career, Ryan brings to BDL a strong sense of teamwork, com­munication and drive to set and accomplish goals by any means. His educa­tional back­ground in both electrical and mechanical systems has aided him in quickly understanding how to test stoves effectively by utilizing the tools available in the lab. He is also researching and developing a longer tunnel for Burn Design Lab’s Kuniokoa or “rocket stove” to study how it affects performance and feed time. In his free time, Ryan en­joys maintaining relation­ships with college friends through online video games, playing basketball, hiking and camping in the Pacific Northwest.