Modern-day inventor
As a child, Paul Lazarescu dreamed of becoming an inventor. “I always loved building things,” he says. “For my birthday presents, I’d get remote-control cars and kits, and I once tried to make myself a hovering magnetic car — it didn’t work,” he chuckles.Lazarescu was born in South Africa, where his father had emigrated, by way of Israel, after fleeing Romania’s Communist regime in the 1960s. When he was four years old, his family moved to southern California, where Lazarescu and his two siblings grew up. Now a mechanical engineering major in his senior year at MIT, Lazarescu is on the way to achieving his childhood dream: He’s designed a hand exerciser for stroke rehabilitation, a wheelchair attachment for off-road travel, and a structure for mounting NASA sensors on airplanes. Paul Lazarescu Photo: Allegra Boverman When he’s not busy with classes and internships, Lazarescu spends time with his fraternity brothers in...