Ria Shroff is enthusiastic, adventurous, curious, and full of energy. A California native, she is now a junior at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute pursuing a dual major in Biomedical Engineering (BME)(premed) and Design, Innovation, and Society (DIS) and a minor in Science and Technology Studies (STS). She is committed to creating sustainable technologies and is interested in how such technologies can be leveraged within the fields of medicine and education.

She has a zeal for learning and engaging with new experiences. When Ria first got to school she threw herself into the many opportunities the school had to offer including Strut (the women’s Ultimate Frisbee team), juggling club, and tutor time. Tutor time allowed her to interact with students within the Troy community and better understand the needs of students within this district which were quite different from those of students from her hometown. Ria has since been committed to developing products through participatory and user-centered design to attempt to make every design decision both intentional and useful.

Several amazing professors and mentors helped her start to actualize some of her ideas over the course of her sophomore year at college. In October 2016, with the help of an STS professor, Brandon Costelloe-Kuehn, and a classmate, Sebastian Garcia, she won first place in a school-wide competition, ”Burt Swersey’s Call for Challenge Studio Proposals” for an idea to design an Emergency Response Medical Drone and is currently working with a team to create it. In the spring 2017 semester, she also began working on a second project with her sister within the field of gynecology; this is currently in the phase of being refined based on promising preliminary tests. Additionally, Ria joined Dr. Deva Chan’s lab early in the spring semester of 2017 and is currently researching chemical and mechanical methods to simulate intervertebral disc degeneration.

She hopes that through University Innovation Fellows, she can enable other students on campus to actualize their many brilliant ideas.

When she has time, Ria enjoys playing piano and singing, going for midnight strolls, meditating, creating, and adventuring with friends. If you are interested in collaborating, sharing ideas, or just talking, Ria can be reached at shrofr@rpi.edu or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/ria.shroff.33.