INT³ - Interdisciplinary International Internships

This project tackles the global challenge faced by 2.4 billion people who still cook with wood, animal waste, or charcoal, exposing themselves to harmful smoke while contributing to environmental degradation. Together with vulnerable communities in Lubumbashi (DR Congo), we co-create affordable solar cookers that use free solar energy, improve household health, protect tropical forests, and provide safe cooking and water-heating options. By designing low-cost prototypes made from locally available recycled materials—and developing a sustainable business model for small local companies—we aim to ensure that solar cookers can be produced, adapted, and distributed within the region. Through a multidisciplinary collaboration between University of Lubumbashi (UniLu) and UHasselt, supported by VLIR-UOS, engineers, physicists, statisticians, economists, and social scientists co-develop new designs, test innovations, and educate future changemakers committed to advancing the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

At UHasselt, 3 generations of interdisciplinary teams of students have been working on the project to design and optimize these solar cookers. Engineering and physics students will play a key role in the design and development of the cookers, while statisticians will assist with optimizing performance through data analysis and optimal design of experiments. The performance of the prototypes will be tested according to an international protocol, and a weather and testing station will be built by students in electronic engineering to support this work.

In addition to the technical aspects, the project will involve the creation of a business plan aimed at developing small-scale companies that can manufacture and distribute these cookers at affordable prices. Initial tests on prototype solar cookers and commercial devices have already been conducted, and this next phase will refine the design and prepare it for real-world use in communities around the world.

We are looking for students

We are looking for students in statistics and data science, physics, business economics and engineering. 

Only students who can integrate this project into a course within their study program are eligible to participate (for example: Experimental Techniques (Physics), International Window of Mobility (Engineering), bachelor’s or master’s theses, …).

Dar es Salaam faces a severe waste management crisis, with rapid urban growth generating far more waste than the city can collect, leading to pollution, health risks, and lost economic opportunities. This project tackles that problem by empowering communities—especially women, youth, and low-income groups—with the knowledge, skills, and tools to transform waste from a burden into a valuable resource. Through hands-on training, awareness campaigns, and the development of small-scale waste-to-resource businesses, residents learn to sort waste, produce biogas and biofertilizer, and create affordable building materials, while universities and local partners work together to strengthen research, influence policy, and build a circular economy model that can be scaled across Tanzania and beyond.

Students will: 

• Map the local waste stream (sorting, handling, …)

• Will investigate ways of transitioning waste to resources

• Develop prototypes of waste-to-resource conversion

• Develop a game to educate pupils about waste management and waste-to-resources

We are looking for students. 

We are looking for students in social sciences, education studies, business economics, architecture, sciences (biology and chemistry) and engineering.

The Co-creating Wellness project aims to gain a deeper understanding of both the challenges and strengths of the Melusi (Gomora) informal settlement through participatory action research, addressing the growing inequalities reflected in South Africa’s expanding informal communities. There are many challenges that people face within an informal community, including a lack of waste management, inadequate health infrastructure, poor road infrastructure, energy problems, and others. By engaging directly with the community, the project aims to generate knowledge that supports more just, inclusive, and sustainable urban futures. Within this project, a group of students from the Department of Architecture at the University of Pretoria will collaborate with a multidisciplinary team at UHasselt to research and implement a project in close partnership with the community. 

Watch the video of one of the previous projects in the community.

We are looking for students

We are looking for Master students in architecture, engineering (including knowledge of energy/solar systems), construction, as well as life sciences and law.