Dr. Santos' research interests lie at the intersection of systems engineering, disaster risk analysis, and economics. He has been involved in critical infrastructure protection projects including transportation, electric power, and oil/gas process control systems. He utilizes and develops extensions to the economic input-output model to predict the ripple effects of disasters across interdependent infrastructure and economic systems. He explores research topics on coupled workforce-infrastructure recovery strategies and their applications to disasters, notably hurricanes and disease pandemics.