Yingying Li

I am an assistant professor in the Department of Industrial and Enterprise Systems Engineering (ISE) and the Coordinated Science Laboratory (CSL) at UIUC. I am also affiliated with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and the Department of Mechanical Science and Engineering (MechSE).

My research lies in the intersection of statistical/reinforcement learning, control, and optimization. I am especially interested in online and/or distributed learning for control and optimization with safety & optimality guarantees, with applications in smart grids and smart cities. Things I work on include online optimal control, safe learning-based control, online convex optimization, reinforcement learning, multi-armed bandit, decentralized learning for control, reliable mechanism design, etc.

I am actively looking for self-motivated Ph.D. students and postdocs with a strong background in mathematics and interests in applications of online learning and deep learning. Students with a strong background in mathematics, computer science, applied mathematics, statistics, and/or operation research are especially welcome to apply. Please feel free to apply to the Department of Industrial and Enterprise Systems Engineering, the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and/or the Department of Mechanical Science and Engineering, and mention my name in your application if you are interested in joining our group!

This year, our group has two PhD openings. I am especially looking for applicants with a background and have an interest in contextual multi-armed bandits, reinforcement learning, and/or LLMs. Please shoot me an email if you are interested!

Contact

Address: 1308 W Main Street, Urbana, IL 61801
Office Location: Coordinated Science Lab Room 347