• Brooke Owens Fellow, Class of 2022

• Washington University, Major: Mechanical Engineering Minor: Human Computer Interaction, Computer Science, ‘22

• Host Institution: Rocket Lab

• Executive Mentor: Tess Hatch

• Brookie Mentor: Beimnet Shitaye

Vaishali Shah is a fourth year undergraduate at Washington University in St. Louis (WashU) majoring in Mechanical Engineering and minoring in both Computer Science and Human Computer interaction. Her interests center around how users interact with technological interfaces and how the design process can be used to improve these. She is also interested in developments in solar energy applications.

From creating Rube Goldberg machines in school to participating in the regional science fair every year since kindergarten Vaishali acquired an interest in design and engineering at a young age. Her interests in space blossomed from listening to her uncle’s work on satellites as well as getting a telescope as a gift as a child. She is extremely interested in space and what lies in the unknown beyond our planet.

At WashU, Vaishali is involved in Design for America, a multidisciplinary human centered design group working on projects with YMCA Nationals and LaunchCode and worked previously as the new member educator and now mentors working teams. She also worked in the Musculoskeletal Soft Tissue Laboratory on a project using Matlab and a stereovision 3D camera to determine the distance between two points on a phantom object. One of her favorite projects in college was when she worked to create an adaptive video game controller, which involved a sliding wood mechanism hitting a button, for a client to play with only their arm. She is also a leader in the WashU Wilderness Project which seeks to bring first years into the neutral state of nature to self reflect on their transition to college and grow.

Vaishali’s experiences outside of WashU include being a product design intern at Vortex Medical Instruments and creating devices to aid in efficiency of manufacturing as well as being a research and design intern at Takoda and aiding in the creation of a mobile and online application to connect therapists with their clients with substance use disorders. Most recently, Vaishali worked at Momentus Space in the Mission Management team.

Vaishali loves cooking, running, hiking and enjoying nature as well as drawing. She is currently training for a half marathon in April!

As a Brooke Owens Fellow, Vaishali is extremely excited to be interning at Rocket Labs in Long Beach, CA.