Kiara Nirghin, a scientist from Johannesburg, is the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Chima, a generative AI startup in San Francisco. She co-founded Chima with her sister, Nikhara Nirghin, who raised over $5 million (R82.5 million) from prominent international investors.
Kiara attended Stanford University to study computer science, focusing on artificial intelligence after winning the global Google Science Fair grand prize for her citrus-based drought innovation.
With her "fighting drought with fruit" submission in 2016, Kiara defeated students from all over the world to win a $50,000 scholarship. Her work reacted to South Africa's recent drought. Crop failures and animal deaths resulted from the worst drought since 1982. Kiara used avocado skins and orange peels to make an organic drought polymer.
In a viral reel shared by Instagram user @zephzoid in October 2026, the American content creator praised Kiara's trajectory, stating, "This is proof that South African genius knows no bounds—she went from tackling local drought issues in Johannesburg to building the future of enterprise AI in Silicon Valley."
In her presentation, Nirghin described how she developed a superabsorbent and biodegradable substance that can be "planted" next to crops to produce "mini reservoirs of water in the soil." She started by boiling orange peels in water to create a liquid that was high in pectin, a carbohydrate that is very absorbent.
After that, she mixed the pectin with bits of dried avocado skins and orange peels, baked the mixture to extract moisture, and ground it all into a powder. At last, she combined the powder with additional peels and skins. In water, the resultant polymer could retain 300 times its weight. The invention kept the soil moist during tests, and plants grown with it grew taller, healthier, and produced more flowers.
Kiara now serves as the co-founder and chief technology officer (CTO) of Chima, an artificial intelligence company based in San Francisco, California.
Founded alongside her sister Nikhara, the startup builds advanced generative AI systems focused on compound human reasoning to automate complex enterprise workflows for global corporations.
Next-generation AI platforms are being developed by a Stanford scholar and Thiel Fellow.
According to the BBC, Kiara, a student at the Anglican Church-founded St. Martin's High School in Johannesburg, developed the "orange peel mixture" as a substitute for pricey and non-biodegradable superabsorbent polymers (SAPs) after conducting three experiments over 45 days. According to her, it was created using leftovers from the juice production sector.
These ingredients included naturally occurring oils in avocado skins and molecules present in orange peels. "The product is fully biodegradable, low-cost and has better water-retaining properties than commercial SAPs. The only resources involved in the creation of the 'orange peel mixture' were electricity and time; no special equipment nor materials were required," Kiara added in her online submission.
Since then, she has been featured by TIME Magazine and Forbes on their Most Influential lists. She is also a Thiel Fellow, the youngest board member of the Google Impact Fund, and a Y Combinator alum.