Dr. Ning Li (January 14, 1943 – July 27, 2021) was a Chinese-American physicist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville whose theoretical framework for generating anti-gravity effects using rotating superconductors may be the closest academic description of UAP propulsion physics ever published in peer-reviewed literature. In a series of papers with Douglas Torr published in Physical Review D (1991), Physical Review B (1992), and Foundations of Physics Letters (1993), Li demonstrated theoretically that ions rotating in a high-temperature superconducting disc, when aligned in a Bose-Einstein condensate, could generate a gravitomagnetic field perpendicular to their spin axis — producing a strong repulsive force against gravity. Not speculative fiction. Peer-reviewed physics in major journals.
The DoD connection: NASA Marshall Space Flight Center funded and participated in Li’s research in the 1990s. She also sought and received funding from US Army Aviation and Missile Command. In 1999, frustrated with institutional pace, she left UAH to found AC Gravity LLC — specifically to continue anti-gravity research outside the university. In 2001, AC Gravity received a US Department of Defense grant of $448,970 for continued anti-gravity research. The grant period ended 2002. No results were ever made public. In 2003, she presented “Measurability of AC Gravity Fields” at a MITRE Corporation conference alongside an official from Redstone Arsenal/US Army Aviation and Missile Command.
Top-secret clearance → total silence: According to her son George Men (Huntsville Business Journal, 2023), after Li received a top-secret security clearance, she ceased all publication and ceased discussing her research findings. The same pattern as every other scientist in this cluster: obtain clearance, stop producing public record, disappear from the scientific literature. Her work with the DoD after 2002 is classified. FOIA requests for her research have been denied.
China’s interest — and its warning: In 2008, Chinese government officials approached Li with an offer to return to China to continue her anti-gravity research. She rejected the offer. Subsequently, Chinese authorities refused to grant her permission to return to China even to attend her own mother’s funeral. A foreign government valued her work enough to block her family travel when she declined to cooperate. That is not how governments treat irrelevant scientists.
The 2014 accident and death: In 2014, Li was struck by a vehicle while crossing the street on the UAH campus. Her husband witnessed the accident, suffered a heart attack, and died in 2015. Li sustained permanent brain damage and developed Alzheimer’s disease. She died July 27, 2021. Rep. Tim Burlison flagged Dr. Li as an additional case in the congressional investigation of the 11+ missing and dead scientists with UAP/nuclear/aerospace ties. AC Gravity LLC remains listed as an active business as of 2025.
Physics significance: Li’s theoretical framework — gravitomagnetic field generation via superconducting ion rotation — directly describes the propulsion mechanism that Charles Buhler’s propellantless thrust experiments appear to validate empirically. If UAP craft operate via AC gravity or related electromagnetic-gravitational coupling, Li’s 1991-1993 papers are the theoretical foundation. Her clearanced, classified, unpublished post-2002 work may be the experimental validation.
TAGS: NING LI · AC GRAVITY LLC · DOD $448,970 GRANT · TOP-SECRET CLEARANCE · CHINA BLOCKED TRAVEL · FOIA DENIED · BURLISON FLAGGED