Diana G. Ramirez-Rios, Ph.D.

I am an assistant professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo, with a Ph.D. in Transportation Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, with a B.S.-M.S. in Industrial Engineering. I am passionate about policy-driven, empirical, and multidisciplinary research. My work focuses on disaster response logistics, urban freight transportation, and supply chain optimization. Theoretical work includes facility location and post-disaster distribution modeling, freight demand modeling, freight routing and simulation models, and game-theoretic models for supply chain cooperation. Practice and policy-driven research include quantifying and allocating freight externalities (e.g., air pollution from freight deliveries) and policy-making decision in disaster response logistics. My empirical research includes the economic valuation for the lack of relief supplies in post-disaster response, social vulnerability, freight trip generation and service trip generation models. I have strong theoretical foundations in operations research, statistical analyses, and economics.

Research Highlights

Disaster Response Logistics

Critical Infrastructure impacts on socially vulnerable communities

Facility location-allocation models for post-disaster distribution of critical relief

Continuous Approximation of deprivation costs of human suffering

Economic valuation of water deprivation in post-disaster environments

Transportation barriers to health care in post-disaster environments

Urban Freight Transportation

Freight demand and routing models to estimate vehicle emissions

Commercial vehicle parking in urban areas

Freight tour synthesis modeling

Freight-efficient initiatives and policies

Supply Chain Optimization

Game-theoretic models for horizontal/vertical supply chain collaboration

Mathematical models for 2 and 3-echelon supply chains

Recent Highlights

December 2024: Granted a National Science Foundation RAPID grant to study "Exploring Impacts of Cascading Failure and Recovery Efforts of Interdependent Critical Infrastructure in Socially Vulnerable Puerto Rican Communities After Hurricane Fiona ."

November 2022: Elected Vice-President of POMS Regional Vice President Americas (January 2023- December 2025)

January 2022: Elected as a member of the INFORMS Sub-Divisions Council as Fora Representative

December 2021: Received a grant from the Natural Hazards Center to study the "Transportation Barriers to Health Care Access in Post-Disaster Environments of Socially Vulnerable Communities in Puerto Rico."

May 2021: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute grants the Karen and Lester Gerhardt Prize in Science and Engineering (1982)

May 2021: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute grants the Thomas Archibald Price (1964) – Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

December 2020: Graduated from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

October 2020: Recieves the Helene M. Overly/ Leonard Braun Graduate Scholarship from WTS International

October 2020: Recieves the Bayer Scholarship from INFORMS Analytics Society

October 2020: Recieves a registration scholarship from the INFORMS Minority Issues Forum to attend the Doctoral Student Colloquia and Annual Meeting

November 2019: Invited by the U.S. Department of Transportation to speak at the Talking Freight Webinar: International Urban Freight (I-NUF) Conference Presentations, Part 1 – Curbside Delivery Challenges and Opportunities to present “On-Street Parking Requirements for Freight and Service Activity.”

October 2019: Attends the MIT CEE Rising Stars Workshop

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