Khushi Thakkar, a freshman at Jasper High School,is an active science research oriented student. She has competed successfully at the regional, state and national competitions with her projects in her eighth and ninth grade. She was placed first at the Exxon Mobil Science and Engineering Fair in Texas State and was a 2016 Broadcom semifinalist. She competed at TJAS (First), and TJSH (4th grand prize). This gave her an opportunity to compete nationally in the AJAS (Boston) and NJSH (San Diego). In her ninth grade she was placed first in her category at the Beal Bank sponsored Dallas Regional Science Fair and was selected a runner-up grand prize in Physical Sciences Division. She will represent as a finalist at ISEF in LA from May 13 to May 19. She has been a math and science student at SAMVID. We are proud of Khushi and wish her good luck in competing successfully at ISEF.
Khushi's Projects
Her project titled “From Wash to Squash: A Novel Approach to Purifying Used Household Water for Agricultural Applications” aimed to develop a cheap and accessible method of purifying grey water. Khushi came up with this idea after noticing that the severe watering restrictions that were enforced in her neighborhood during times of drought harmed plants and wondered if household wastewater could instead be used to grow plants in harsh conditions. Khushi hopes that her filtration system can be manufactured on a large scale and distributed around the United States to encourage people to reuse grey water.
Her ninth grade project, "Testing Waters: Chitosan Based Water Filter for Industrial and Third World Applications", focused on purifying industrial-runoff contaminated water using environmentally-friendly materials. The filtration systems that she created were economical, ecologically-safe, and extremely effective at removing contaminants such as Lead and Copper from water. She hopes to continue this project and hopefully industrialize both the family-sized and portable filters. The family-sized portable filter costs under $5 to manufacture and has an economical price point for third world countries.