Shreedutt C. Hegde
Hardware and FPGA system design  

I have participated in 3 hackathons so far, which have made me passionate about hacking. The most recent was Pennapps 2016(!!) and it was THE best hacking experience I have had. I got access to some cool new hardware and developed a virtual computation server for biomedical applications. The second was a 32-hour hackfest "Make-a-thon" wherein our team developed a portable water hardness detector, which enables one to determine , on the go, whether water is safe for consumption. This was built to address the widespread water-borne disease issue in India, as well as poor quality of ground water in rural areas. The third was a 48-hour "EduHackathon"  which called for solutions addressing the higher education problems in the country.  We responded with a website, that helps students make informed decisions about their career, and choose the education plan based on it. 

Apart from hacking in competitions, I also hacked a new firmware for a wireless USB dongle(CC1111) , which enabled it to act as a bi-directional transceiver as opposed to it's default receive-only functionality. This was used for setting up bi-directional wireless connection between a neurostimulator brain implant and a PC at University of Toronto,Canada. [Report] [Video]

I would love coming to PennApps to make use of my experience in prototyping projects on wide variety of hardware platforms , like Raspberry Pi, Arduino, Altera FPGA and atmel microcontrollers, giving me a head start for hacking by getting into "What can be done?" instead of "How can it be done?".