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BMBrian Maina

Computer Science + Economics / Boston University / Class of 2028

Brian Maina

Most of my work is backend systems: APIs, caching layers, and data pipelines. Payments infrastructure is where I want to go deeper.

C++ / Python / FastAPI / PostgreSQL / Redis / Docker / AWS

Now

  • AdaptXSoftware Engineer Intern
  • Marintchev LabUndergraduate Research Assistant
  • Hack4ImpactJunior Development Team
  • Alpha Kappa PsiVice President of Administrative Affairs
  • Summer 2027Seeking SWE internship
See projectsRésumé
Brian Maina

Boston, MA. Currently building backend systems in Python and C++.

By the numbers

0.5M+
events/sec
269K
messages replayed
32×
latency reduction
70+
active users

About

I'm a Computer Science and Economics student at Boston University, graduating in 2028. Most of what I build is backend, APIs, caching layers, data pipelines, and lately I've been going deeper on systems programming in C++.

I got interested in payments this summer. I was building donation and registration flows for a nonprofit, pulling money in through four different providers that all reported it differently, and getting them to reconcile into one backend turned out to be the hard part. That problem is what I want to keep working on.

Currently: C++ systems programming / open source contributions

What I'm into

Backend

FastAPI and Node services, PostgreSQL, Redis, Docker, and the AWS pieces I had to learn to deploy them.

Payments & fintech

Donation and registration flows across providers that disagree with each other, and parsing bank statement exports.

Systems programming

C++17 against real market data. Order books, lock-free queues, and finding out how much of the performance advice holds up.

Tools I've used

Languages

Python, C++, JavaScript, TypeScript, SQL, Java

Frameworks & libraries

FastAPI, SQLAlchemy, React, React Native, Node.js, Express, XGBoost

Databases & infrastructure

PostgreSQL, Redis, Docker, AWS (ECS Fargate, S3, RDS, EC2), Supabase, Firebase

Tools & platforms

Git, GitHub Actions, Jest, Supertest, pytest, Vercel, Railway

Education

B.A. Computer Science and Economics

Boston University / Boston, MA / Expected May 2028

Coursework

  • Data Structures & Algorithms
  • Computer Systems
  • Software Engineering
  • Databases
  • Linear Algebra
  • Theory of Computing Languages
  • Empirical Economics
  • Economics in Legal Issues
  • Discrete Math

Projects

Project 01In progress

Project Winston

A research platform for market data. Ingestion, feature engineering and model serving, across 17 commodity futures and 503 S&P 500 names.

  • Built the ingestion and feature pipeline, then stacked XGBoost and LightGBM classifiers on top with walk-forward out-of-sample validation.
  • Added HMM regime detection to gate signals, so they get suppressed in conditions where the model has not been reliable.
Year
2026–
Lang
Python
Scale
17

17 commodity futures

Open →
Project 02Complete

Order Matching Engine

A limit order book in C++17, replaying real NASDAQ market data so I could check it against ground truth instead of input I made up.

  • Replayed 269K LOBSTER NASDAQ messages at over 0.5M events/sec, and got to 70% snapshot agreement with the recorded book.
  • Implemented price-time priority matching across limit, market, cancel and modify orders, with O(log n) book updates.
Year
2026
Lang
C++17
Scale
269K

269K messages replayed

Open →
Project 03In progress

Open Source

Pull requests to projects I actually use.

  • Apache Superset (74k★): merged a fix correcting the German security-menu translations.
  • Hermes-WebUI (17k★): opened a fix for mobile dictation cutting out mid-sentence. It treated a thinking pause as the end of speech, so I switched it to continuous recognition and held a screen wake lock. Not merged.
Year
2026–
Lang
Python
Scale
74k★

74k★ Apache Superset

Open →
Project 04Complete

TriLive

A transit app I co-built and shipped to the App Store. I own the backend and the caching layer.

  • Built the FastAPI backend and the TriMet ingestion layer that serves live vehicle positions.
  • Got stop lookups from 16ms to 0.5ms with Redis caching and Geo queries for nearby stops. That was the first time caching made an obvious difference for me.
Year
2025–2026
Lang
FastAPI
Scale
70+

70+ App Store users

Open →
Project 05Complete

NutriCheck

A mobile app that turns a barcode into a personalized read on a food product. The same item scores differently depending on your health profile.

  • Wrote the scoring service that rates products 0 to 100 and flags ingredients against the user's conditions: diabetes, hypertension, allergies, dietary restrictions.
  • Barcode scanning through expo-camera, with a name-search fallback for codes that are missing or too scuffed to read.
Year
2026
Lang
Expo
Scale
0–100

0–100 personalized score

Open →
Project 06Complete

StatementWrapped

A tool that takes raw bank statement exports and turns them into a readable breakdown of where the money actually went.

  • Normalized CSVs across 4 bank formats that all disagree about column names and date formats. Around 1ms per 100 rows once it settled.
  • Categorized transactions with an LLM behind a 6-endpoint REST API.
Year
2026
Lang
FastAPI
Scale
4

4 bank formats

Open →

Archive

Older and smaller things I built.

  • QuantSnap

    Stock screener I built to rank 300+ tickers across 12 sectors on live market data, in a terminal-style interface.

    GitHub

  • TabStream

    Chrome extension that works out which song a YouTube video is and pulls up guitar tabs for it.

    GitHub

  • Cerco

    Campus events app. Browse, save, RSVP and map events, behind student-only auth.

    GitHub

  • Logistik

    Java desktop app for tracking trucks and drivers, replacing a paper-and-spreadsheet process.

    GitHub

Where I've worked

  1. May 2026 – Aug 2026

    Software Engineer Intern

    AdaptX / Nonprofit, fitness accessibility platform / Boston, MA

    • Donation and registration flows across four payment providers that all reported money differently. Reconciling them was the hard part, and the reason I got into payments.
    • Pulled 1,000+ profiles and 72 fundraising campaigns out of RunSignUp, Zeffy and JotForm into one view in Bloomerang.
    • Built the React Native app and FastAPI backend for amputee rehab, virtual 5K participation and race registration.
    • Automated ingestion of 13K race photos, and built an admin dashboard for moderating community posts and training guides.
    ZEFFYRUNSIGNUPJOTFORMBLOOMERANGDIFFERENT SCHEMASNORMALIZATIONLAYERFASTAPIBACKENDPOSTGRESQL
    Four providers reporting the same money differently, reconciled into one backend.

    FastAPI / React Native / AWS ECS Fargate / RDS / S3 / Docker

  2. Mar 2026 – Present

    Undergraduate Research Assistant

    Marintchev Lab / BU Dept. of Pharmacology, Physiology & Biophysics / Boston, MA

    • Verifying NMR backbone assignments for protein 5MP1 in CARA, working toward a lab publication.
    • Got carbon peak matching accuracy up 53% by cross-referencing backbone (Cα/Cβ) against side-chain shift lists.
    • Extending the pipeline to proton peaks, to pull sequence information out of lower-quality spectra.

    Python / NMR / CARA / Data pipelines / Scientific computing

  3. Sep 2025 – Dec 2025

    Software Engineer Intern

    Portal / EdTech startup / Remote

    • Built ATS resume scoring with PDF and JSON ingestion across 3 formats, 25% more accurate against their recruiter benchmark.
    • Cut response time by caching hot resume data and parsed output in Redis with a 24-hour expiry.
    • Wrote 360+ Jest tests across auth, account recovery and payments, which cut the QA cycle by 60%.

    Node.js / Redis / Jest / Supertest / PDF/JSON parsing

Clubs & leadership

  1. May 2026 – Present

    Vice President of Administrative Affairs

    Alpha Kappa Psi / Nu Chapter, Boston University / Boston, MA

    • Built and still maintain the chapter member portal in React, Node/Express and PostgreSQL. 70+ members use it.
    • Added a family-tree visualizer, alumni directory search and a points engine, to replace a pile of spreadsheets.

    React / Node.js / Express / PostgreSQL

    GitHubLive
  2. May 2026 – Present

    Junior Development Team

    Hack4Impact / Boston University / Boston, MA

    • Building front-end features for the Boston Municipal Research Bureau site redesign, which city policymakers use.
    • Moving a legacy WordPress site onto something accessible and searchable, covering decades of research.

    React / WordPress / Accessibility

  3. May 2025 – May 2026

    Treasurer

    German Culture Club / Boston University / Boston, MA

    • Manage a $1,780 semester budget across events, reimbursements and purchase requests.
    • Membership grew 55% while I was treasurer, from 60 to 93.
    • Maintain a ~$1,000 reserve fund to stabilize operations across funding cycles.
  4. Sep 2024 – May 2025

    Assistant Outreach Lead

    Engineers Without Borders / Boston University chapter / Boston, MA

    • Brought projected well-construction costs down 60%, from $50,000 to $20,000, by finding alternative contractors.
    • Cut turnaround 30% by coordinating 5+ engineers on bid analysis for the Ogiek Kwanza Project.
  5. Jun 2023 – Sep 2023

    Co-founder

    Digify Dubai / Digital literacy initiative / Dubai, UAE

    • Co-founded a digital literacy initiative that trained 30+ migrant workers a week.
    • Taught sessions on language learning and mobile banking.
    • Sourced and set up 20 laptops so every session had enough machines to run.

    Featured in Khaleej Times

GitHub activity

Contributions

LessMore

1,944

Last year

8 days

Current

11 days

Longest

25

Repos

Recent commits

Get in touch

Email is the fastest way to reach me.