Santiago Arribas is a research professor of the Spanish Research Council (CSIC) at the Center for Astrobiology (CAB),  in Madrid.

Education:

• PhD in Astrophysics (Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, Universidad de La Laguna, 1987)
• B.Sc. in Physics (Universidad Complutense de Madrid, 1981). MSc.: Instituto de Óptica- CSIC/UCM (1982)

Previous Positions:

• Staff Scientist – CSIC (1990-2000, Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias)
• Research Scientist – CSIC (2000- 2007, Instituto de Astrofísíca de Canarias)
• Astronomer of the European Space Agency  (2000- 2006, Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, EEUU)
• Research Professor – CSIC (2007- present)

Brief outline

Santiago Arribas carried out his PhD thesis on the determination of fundamental stellar parameters at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC, Tenerife), in collaboration with the groups of the Astrophysics Department (Oxford),  and the Imperial College (London) (1983-1987). During his stay at the IAC he also carried out studies and instrumental developments on Integral Field Spectroscopy (IFS) for the telescopes of La Palma Observatory, and he applied this new technique to the study of galaxies.

He then moved to the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI, Baltimore, USA), as staff member of the European Space Agency. There he worked for 6 years (2000-2006) at the  «Division of Science» and the «Division of Scientific Instruments» of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), as well as for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).  Since 1998 he is involved with the JWST project, having participated in the original proposal to ESA for the European contribution, as well as  in several committees and working groups. Currently he is member of  the NIRSpec Instrument Science Team, and of the JWST Science Working Group.

Santiago Arribas is also co-Investigator and member of the Science Team of HARMONI, an integral field spectrograph for the European – Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) of ESO (European Southern Observatory), which has been selected  as a «First Light» instrument.

Currently his research activity is mainly in the field of the formation and evolution of galaxies. He develops several observational programs aimed at studing local luminous star-forming galaxies making use of the telescopes of ESO, the IAC, and the HST. He is also preparing several major research programs to be carried out with the James Webb Space Telescope to study the primeval galaxies formed in the early Universe.

He is member of the Spanish Astronomical Society (SEA), the European Astronomical Society (EAS), and the International Astronomical Union (IAU).