Sarah Li enjoying her other passion: hiking.

A&A Ph.D. student Sarah Li has earned an Amelia Earhart Scholarship, one of only 35 awarded to doctoral aerospace students worldwide.

Sarah, a researcher in the Autonomous Controls Lab, works on predicting and regulating the system-level behavior of competing autonomous agents. This work can be applied to lower earth orbit satellite networks, UAV swarms, or upcoming delivery vehicles on our roads. By modeling these systems as dynamic games, Sarah's research proposes methods to design optimal incentives for individual agents to make decisions that benefit the entire system. For example, capping the number of satellites in the same orbit or designing communication links within a drone network that doesn’t interfere with other networks benefits all of the agents in these systems.

Zonta International, a global organization that empowers women through service and advocacy, has been operating for over 100 years and counted Amelia Earhart as one of its esteemed members. In her honor, Zonta runs this program that awards each recipient a $10,000 scholarship.