Asray Gopa

asraygopa.com · github · linkedin

About

My name is Asray Gopa. I don’t always know exactly what I’m doing, but I’m the kind of person who wants to figure it out. I like learning in public, experimenting, and understanding how things actually work: whether that’s software systems or markets.

I originally came into college thinking I’d major in finance, but I ended up choosing computer science. Not because everyone around me did, but because I realized I wanted to build. I’ve always been drawn to solving problems and creating things from scratch. CS gave me leverage and the freedom to experiment.

I didn’t know how to code when I started. It was a real learning curve. But I leaned into it. Over time, I got good at building: startups, trading pipelines, open-source projects, hackathon wins, and live systems that actually run in the real world.

I’m naturally pretty outgoing. I like talking to people and I’m not afraid to speak my mind. I’m comfortable taking risks, trying things that might fail, and putting ideas out there. I care more about learning and momentum than looking polished.

Long term, I want to build something that actually matters. Something durable. Something that changes how people operate. I want to create tools and systems that give people leverage and leave a lasting impact.

tldr: curious guy; 6x hackathon winner; 8x pitch comp winner; 6x student Leader; 3x researcher; 1x exited founder; The Brik & AxA Trading

Career

Principal Financial Group — Software Engineering Intern May 2025 – Present · Des Moines, IA
  • Built and deployed 3 full-stack applications (Node.js + Spring Boot), saving teams 100+ hours per week
  • Implemented chaos engineering on AWS, reducing downtime risk by 20%+ while optimizing cloud spend
  • Supported data and disaster recovery strategies protecting actuarial models underpinning billions in assets
Collins Aerospace — Software Engineer Contractor Sep 2025 – Dec 2025 · Remote
  • Cut artifact reconciliation time by 30% via unified certification workflow system
  • Reduced engineering errors by ~25% with graph-based traceability and baseline management
  • Increased requirement coverage visibility by 40% with a Next.js impact visualization frontend

Research

NSF — Moothedath Research Lab Jan 2025 – Sep 2025 · Ames, IA
  • Prototyped decentralized ML models in Python for scalable multi-task learning
  • Applied spectral clustering and graph algorithms, boosting accuracy 15% in benchmarks
  • Deployed distributed training on AWS EC2, achieving 30% faster convergence
NSF — ARA Wireless Labs May 2024 – Dec 2024 · Ames, IA
  • Designed deep learning models for wireless spectrum data, improving signal detection by 25%
  • Built LoRAMesh sensor hub using ML and computer vision to detect crop health and pests
  • Automated data ingestion and hardware setup, cutting manual work by 40+ hours/week
CS Independent Study — COM S 4090 Jan 2026 – May 2026 · Ames, IA

Investigating Continuous Thought Machines as an alternative to Transformers for reasoning over real-time financial orderbook streams. Comparing CTMs vs Transformers on Bitcoin price prediction tasks.

Entrepreneurship

The Brik. Aug 2023 – Present

Designed and launched a compact physical organizational tool from concept to market. Handled 3D printing, laser cutting, manufacturer partnerships, and social media marketing. Sold to hundreds of customers.

Chief Executive Officer — HerdRight Jan 2024 – Mar 2025

Built herdright.com — a marketplace connecting farmers with bovine reproductive material using React, AWS, and Edge Functions. AI matching, Stripe payments, real-time listings. Led a team of four.

Scalar News Aug 2019 – Sep 2022

Built a daily news service delivering stories in under 50 words. Grew to 2.9M annual readers. Built an Expo app using LLMs for automated journalism.

Chief Executive Officer — Teen Talks Money Sep 2019 – Sep 2022

Founded a financial literacy org reaching 25,000+ monthly. Led a team of 40 creators, writers, marketers, and designers. Spoke on podcasts, student magazines, and articles.

Projects

Live

the-brik.com/wallet — Minimalist wallet, designed and sold to hundreds of customers.

safebite.suppersquad.app — Allergen-friendly digital menu builder for restaurants.

herdright.com — Bovine reproductive material marketplace with AI matching and Stripe.

Scalar News (iOS) — AI-powered personalized news summaries. 2.9M annual readers.

FloorFace (iOS) — Pushup counter: tap your nose to the screen to count reps.

Pippa (iOS) — Gamified nutrition app with virtual pet care instead of calorie tracking.

Libraries

waveshare_transparent_screen_driver (PyPI) — Raspberry Pi driver for Waveshare Transparent OLED. Built because Waveshare didn't ship working Pi code.

zipcode_distance (npm) — Distance calculation and proximity lookup between ZIP codes.

city-state-country-please (npm) — Location autocomplete with fuzzy search and Levenshtein correction.

Projects

ApexNurse — AI nurse assistant with speech recognition and multilingual translation. SwanHacks 2025 (3rd).

ProfAI — Real-time lecture accent translation + AI study assistant querying Canvas, YouTube, Drive. CalHacks 12.0.

FarmVigil — Computer vision cattle disease detector. 96% precision. SMS alerts to farmers.

VetU — AI veterinary telehealth via image recognition. BuildDSM Best Pitch/Demo + 2nd Place.

BusinessCofounder — AI co-founder matching platform. AWS Bedrock. HackMidwest 2024 (3rd).

ScamShield — Live phone scam detector using fine-tuned BERT classifier.

Forex Arbitrage — Graph-based arbitrage detection in live currency markets with ML sentiment layer.

CTM vs Transformers — Comparing Continuous Thought Machines vs Transformers on live Bitcoin orderbook data.

RustBitcoinWallet — Bitcoin wallet from scratch in Rust.

PitchPost — Collegiate pitch competition platform. Next.js. Ivy Hackathon 2025 (3rd).

CyDine — ISU dining app with meal recs and calorie tracking. Best App + Best Project (COM S 3090).

ARuLearning — AR anatomy education via device camera. SwanHacks 2024.

MedListen — Translates medical reports into plain-language audio for patients.

WhistleGuard — Student safety app: emergency whistle, 911, virtual escort, fake call AI.

Collins Aerospace CM System — Cross-tool traceability for aerospace. Flask, Neo4j, Next.js. details

ISU Course Calendar Maker — Exports ISU schedules to Outlook since Workday won't.

ISU Course Seat Monitor — Alerts you when a course seat opens up.

CodeDocuGen — VS Code extension that auto-generates docs using Hugging Face NLP.

githelper — CLI tool to streamline git workflows.

ideas-api — REST API for curating random ideas, hosted on Raspberry Pi via Tailscale.

Saftinet Insurance Card Generator — Automates insurance card creation.

ColoringMindsRecordKeepingSystem — After-school art class management: attendance, fees, automated emails.

Big Nate Scraper — Reverse-engineered GoComics to save Big Nate strips after the paywall.

Gopa Language — English-like programming language for beginners, capable of APIs and servers.

scratch-NN-digits — Neural net from scratch for handwritten digit classification.

SpotifyMLStatsReccoPop — ML-based song recommendations from listening stats.

Old School Egg Catcher — Vintage Nintendo egg-catching game my mom used to play.

DaveBluntsNoCookies — A React web app. No further explanation needed.

tqr — Terminal QR code generator in Rust.

stake-blackjack-helper — Blackjack odds helper.

2048 — 2048 implementation.

ConsoleSnakeGameMac — Snake in the terminal.

autofrickinggoogledocstyper — Automates typing into Google Docs.

promo-collector — Aggregates promo deals.

Low-level

KnightShift Chess Engine — C

AsrayCShellYay — Custom Unix shell in C

SQLMiniDB — Minimal SQL database engine in C++

OverEngineeredPasswordManager — C++

LEGV8 Disassembler — LEGv8 ISA disassembler in C

RustRedditPlotBot — Reddit data scraper and plotter in Rust

Drone Fleet Motion Planning — A* pathfinding through 3D environments in Python

College

Iowa State University — B.S. Computer Science (2022–2026)

Coursework: Motion Planning and Robotics, Web Development, App Development, Database Management Systems, Design and Analysis of Algorithms, Computer Architecture, Discrete Structures, Nanoscale Programming, Machine Learning, Micro Economics

I did entrepreneurship, leadership, research, and innovation work at ISU. Brought myself outside my shell.

Student Government (2022–2025)
LAS Senator, UROC Senator, Legislative Ambassador, UROC Council President and VP. Made a lot of changes and got projects done. Had to quit when it got less about helping students and more about helping friends in the org.
Algorithmic Trading Club President (2025–2026)
Restarted the club with Arjun Patel. Rocky start but proud of where it's going.
Oak-Elm Hall Council President (2022)
Solar Car Team — Software, Strategy, Business (2022–2024)
Learned teamwork and project management. Great people. Shoutout Nick.
Start Something LAS Academy Fellow (2023–2025)
Probably the best thing I did at ISU. Learned real entrepreneurship from Jeff Bull and others.
CS Advisory Board Chair (2025–2026) / Member (2024–2025)
As chair, changed how we give feedback to the department. No holding back.
CyRide Board of Trustees — Student and Mayoral Appointee (2024–2025)
I LOVE CYRIDE. Elected member, got commended by the mayor.
ISUPD Advisory Board (2022–2024) — Discussed fire and e-scooter safety with Chief Newton.
President's Leadership Class (2022–2025) — Learned from President Wintersteen. Real leadership comes from experience though.
Sigma Nu Tau (2025, lifetime) — Entrepreneurship honor society. Got free money from it.
Cardinal Key (2025, lifetime) — Forgot I applied and didn't pay fees. They inducted me anyway. No idea why.

Wins

Hackathons & Competitions

SwanHacks 2025 — 3rd Place · Iowa State Hackathon Club & MLH · Nov 2025

Ivy Hackathon 2025 — 3rd Place · Ivy College of Business · Sep 2025

Principal Intern CodeJam 2025 — Finalist · Top 5 of 25 teams · Jun 2025

Midwest Entrepreneurship Conference Pitch — 1st Place · U Nebraska Omaha · Apr 2025

Ivy Hackathon 2024 — 1st Place · Built VerifyAI, an AI deepfake phone scam detector · Nov 2024

HackMidwest 2024 — 3rd Place (Student Category) · Sep 2024

Ag Innovation Competition — 1st Place · Built Crop Model AI for farmland ROI optimization · Apr 2024

ISU Coding Contest — 1st Place · Kattis puzzles, 5-hour time limit · Mar 2024

BuildDSM — Best Pitch/Demo, 2nd Place Overall · Built vetU, AI vet telehealth · Feb 2024

2023 ISU Innovation Prize — 1st Place (AgTech) · Wildfire detection via low-freq radio. $2,500 prize

Clayton Farms Hackathon 2022 — 1st Place · Website revamp and marketing. $600 prize

Patents

Folding Instrument Comprising Multiple Miniaturized Geometrical Drawing Tools · US 63234252 · Aug 2021
A folding device combining ruler, compass, protractor, set-squares, shape tracer, and divider into one compact instrument.

Honors & Awards

Dean's List — every semester (F22 through S26)

Okoboji Entrepreneurship Institute Cohort 18 — 1 of 33 Iowa's top student entrepreneurs · Aug 2024

Sigma Nu Tau Founder's Scholarship — Dec 2024

Service & Dignity Award — ISU Student Government · Apr 2024

Best Project & App Award — COM S 3090 App Development

Cardinal Key — 2025

Commended by Ames Mayor — CyRide Board service · 2025

Behind the Scenes

standup
i do standup comedy
basketball
basketball is my thing
beach
i want to move to the beach someday
club
i like going out
pool
pool is a serious hobby
travel
i love travelling. been to 30 countries.

TV Shows

Abbott Elementary · Alex Rider · Arrested Development · Arthur · Barry · Better Call Saul · Big Nate · Billions · Black Bird · Black-ish · Blue Bloods · Bojack Horseman · Bizaardvark · Breaking Bad · Brooklyn Nine-Nine · Castle · Chicago Fire · Chicago Med · Citadel · Clifford the Big Red Dog · Cobra Kai · Comicstaan · Community · Covert Affairs · Criminal Minds · Curb Your Enthusiasm · Deli Boy · Dexter · Elementary · Entourage · Euphoria · Everyone Hates Chris · Falcon and the Winter Soldier · Family Guy · Fallout · Friends · Fresh Off the Boat · Fresh Prince of Bel-Air · Fuller House · Gen V · Georgie & Mandy's First Marriage · Gotham · Gravity Falls · Grey's Anatomy · Hawkeye · House · House of Cards · House of Lies · How I Met Your Father · How I Met Your Mother · How to Get Away with Murder · Hunters · Invincible · iZombie · It's Always Sunny · Jack Ryan · Joey · Key and Peele · Killing Eve · Kim's Convenience · Kota Factory · Lethal Weapon · Loki · Loot · Mad Men · Malcolm in the Middle · Marvelous Ms. Maisel · Master of None · Mixed-ish · Modern Family · Modern Love · Money Heist · Monk · Moon Knight · Mr. Robot · Ms. Marvel · MythBusters · Mythic Quest · Never Have I Ever · New Girl · The Newsroom · The Night Manager · Only Murders in the Building · Ozark · Parks and Recreation · Peacemaker · Person of Interest · Phineas and Ferb · Private Practice · Psych · The Purge · Quantico · The Queen's Gambit · Regular Show · The Resident · Rick and Morty · Riverdale · The Rookie · Ruff Ruffman · Saturday Night Live · Scorpion · Scrubs · Severance · Sherlock · Shrinking · Silo · Silicon Valley · Squid Game · Station 19 · Stranger Things · The Studio · Suits · Succession · Supernatural · Superstore · Ted · Ted Lasso · The Test · This Is Us · True Detective · Two and a Half Men · Upload · Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt · Veep · Veronica Mars · Wednesday · WeCrashed · The West Wing · What If · White Collar · WandaVision · Young Sheldon · Your Friends and Neighbors

Blog

Hackathons and why everyone should be doing them

The Bull Semen Story and What I learned from it

I studied in India and failed hard?

Do I wanna be like Tame Impala