Welcome!

Dr. Li is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Environmental Science. Prior to joining Baylor, she was a Postdoc Fellow at Harvard University, where she worked on MethaneSAT and MethaneAIR data analysis and science applications, with a focus on greenhouse gas flux inversion. She is currently collaborating with Harvard as an Associate on the MethaneSAT project.

Her other research projects at Harvard centered on using a coupled modeling framework to investigate the impacts of future changes in climate, vegetation, and land use practices on dust mobilization and wildfire activity. Dr. Li received her Ph.D. at the University of Michigan, where she applied and developed a large-eddy simulation model and regional chemical transport models to interpret the vertical distribution of biogenic volatile organic compounds. At Michigan, she also did a glacial project investigating the impact of aerosol deposition on snowmelt over the Greenland Ice Sheet. Dr. Li’s research interests span from local atmospheric chemistry modeling of trace gases and aerosols to global interpretation of climate and air quality co-benefits.

The Li research group studies atmospheric chemistry in the boundary layer as well as the interactions between air quality and climate change. The importance of our work, which entails the development and application of sophisticated atmospheric models, is in advancing our understanding of the chemical and physical processes of key air pollutants and their changes under future climate. Our research products are of great utility to environmental managers and especially the health impacts community.

Research areas include:

  • High-resolution modeling of urban air quality
  • Trends in wildfire and dust in response to 21st century climate
  • Atmospheric chemistry in the fire smoke polluted boundary layer
  • Trace gas-aerosol-cloud interactions
  • Changes in greenhouse gas emissions and air quality co-benefits