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Photo of Luyao Li.

Beijing resident Luyao Li (’10) had never heard of Mount Allison until a networking event at Qinghua University brought her in touch with Mount Allison’s former Dean of Students, Charlie Hunter. After Hunter’s recommendation, she began researching the University and chose to transfer to Mount Allison for her third and fourth year. Li had already completed two years of Material Science and Engineering at the University of Science and Technology in Beijing, CN.

“I felt that Mount Allison would be able to offer me a very high quality education, and I would enjoy studying overseas and learning about another part of the world,” she says.

Li spent two years studying honours physics and performing research at Mount Allison under the supervision of national award-winning professor and researcher, Dr. Bob Hawkes.

“He played a very important role in making my undergraduate experience at Mount Allison amazing. Among the many things I learned from him, I am most touched by his rigorous attitude toward research and academics, and his strong enthusiasm towards education. He is one of the best teachers I’ve ever had.”

After Mount Allison Li decided to pursue graduate studies in astrophysics and applied to several top astrophysics programs in the United States. She was admitted to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Yale, and Penn State.

She chose MIT because of its academic reputation in science and engineering, as well its proximity to Harvard and the city of Boston, which she felt offered endless opportunities to learn.


The transition to a PhD program in planetary science proved to be initially overwhelming, with the undertaking of a new research project and getting accustomed to a new city, but she says after the first couple of months, she felt ready for the challenge.

“My undergraduate work at Mount Allison gave me a solid knowledge base to welcome the graduate level courses, and I felt as well prepared as any other peers that graduated from much larger universities.”

She is currently working on the testing of a space telescope called ‘ExoplanetSat.’ The mission for this satellite is to look for earth-size, habitable planets outside the solar system by staring at nearby bright stars. Her responsibility is to calibrate the CCD chip and make sure that it can achieve the optical precision required. The planned launch of the prototype of this telescope is in 2012.

Li hopes to complete her PhD in the next five years and then plans to explore the options of academia, or possibly an entrepreneurial venture. She is also passionate about travelling and philanthropy work and would like to some day volunteer in Africa or Latin America.

From Beijing to Sackville and now to Cambridge, Li says she will never forget the people she met at Mount Allison.

“The warm, open, and welcoming characteristics of people at Mount Allison and in Sackville have shaped my personality and made me a open-minded person. It was the most rewarding time of my life.”