Zhi Li

Zhi Li is an Assistant Professor at the University of Colorado Boulder's College of Engineering and Applied Science, Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering. He leads the newly established Flood Lab, focusing on flood prediction and monitoring through remote sensing and coupled hydrologic-hydraulic models.

• Joined CU Boulder in Fall 2025
• Former Dean's Postdoc Fellow at Stanford University
• PhD in Civil Engineering & Environmental Science from University of Oklahoma (2022)

His research spans hydrological modeling, extreme events, and AI4Science applications, particularly in deep learning and intelligent agents for flood risk assessment. Li’s work also connects floods with public health and economic systems, aiming to develop the Flood-Agriculture-Climate-Economics-Disease (FACED) framework.

Key Themes:

• High-resolution flood modeling
• Climate change impacts on hydro-meteorology
• Remote sensing integration
• Flood-agriculture interdependencies
• Global health implications

Scientific Awards:

• Dean's Postdoc Fellow, Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability (2023)
• Hoving Fellowship, University of Oklahoma (2019)

Li’s recent publications emphasize improved precipitation estimation (IMERG V07), Brown Ocean Effect studies, and Fourier neural operators for rapid flood forecasting. His collaborative work with NOAA and NASA focuses on comparing ground-based and spaceborne radar systems for extreme event analysis.