Featured Researcher
Sherrill Lingel
Senior Engineer
For over a decade, Sherrill Lingel has been one of the leaders of PAF’s ongoing research on intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) planning, execution, and assessment. She and her fellow researchers have been working with sponsors in Pacific Air Forces, Air Combat Command, and other commands to develop and expand the models that make analysis of today’s ISR realities possible.
“The Air Force has made a long-term investment in this research, and it is paying off,” she says. “We have seen this work go from a set of fundamental modeling questions to a suite of tools that we can use to help different commands think through real ISR challenges and investment strategies.”
Sherrill has been working on engineering and modeling problems for her entire career. At the University of Washington in Seattle, she earned a master’s degree in aeronautical engineering and a doctorate in civil and environmental engineering, where she worked on modeling and analysis of fluid dynamics in both air and water.
Today at RAND, she applies her skills in engineering and modeling to studying Air Force issues involving ISR, the employment of unmanned aircraft systems, aircraft survivability, and others.
The common thread is an interest in the physical realities that structure such problems and make it possible to model and experiment with potential solutions. “Modeling and simulation can achieve a remarkable degree of fidelity if you remain focused on the physical dimension of what you’re trying to accomplish,” says Sherrill. “There is a lot of theory involved, but your model has to be grounded in the hard science that lies underneath.”
In recognition of her work on ISR modeling, Sherrill received a RAND President’s Award in 2008, which grants 20 days of coverage to pursue research on any topic. She plans to use the time to extend her work into the area of space-based ISR.
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