Ariana Salas-Castillo holds a PhD candidate from the Political Science department at the University of California, Santa Barbara and an M.A. on Sustainable Territorial Development from a joint program between the University of Padova, KU Leuven, and Paris-Sorbonne 1, as well as a B.Sc. in Economics from the University of Costa Rica.
She worked for several years at the Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center (CATIE, after its Spanish acronym) in her native Costa Rica. While there, she developed a deep interest in the intersection between inequality and environment.
Ariana has found that one of the areas where this intersection is most palpable is precisely in transportation, particularly public transportation. Actions towards a sustainable and attractive public transportation system transcend climate action as they have also to do with social justice and public health. Her dissertation research tackles on this issue in the Latin American region.
In Fall 2024, Ariana Salas-Castillo joined the Columbia Climate School Postdoctoral Research Program, where she will continue her research, as well as be part of the Partnership for Research on Informal and Shared Mobility (PRISM), a Global Research Consortium around An Equity, Ecosystems and Engaged Approach to Informal Transport and Shared Mobility.