In brief

The former Japanese ambassador to Croatia, Kaname Ikeda, has been appointed director general of ITER. The decision on Ikeda’s appointment was made last fall at a meeting in Vienna of officials from the European Union and five participating nations—Japan, China, Russia, South Korea, and the US—according to published reports. At press time, an agreement was being formalized for ITER. Ikeda, who studied engineering at the University of Tokyo, joined the Japanese government’s science and technology agency in 1968 and served as both head and deputy vice minister of the research and development bureau and as director of the now-defunct National Space Development Agency of Japan. He was named ambassador to Croatia in 2003. News reports said he was recommended for the ITER post because of his familiarity with science and technology policies and his involvement in significant international projects.

Raymond Chiao, a professor in the physics department of the University of California, Berkeley, has accepted a joint faculty appointment in the fledgling schools of natural science and engineering at UC’s new Merced campus. He is pursuing a new line of research in gravitational radiation. Chiao is an atomic, molecular, and optical physicist whose research focuses on the behavior of photons. UC Merced opened last September as the 10th campus in the UC system.

Douglas B. Chrisey has been named the deputy director for research and development at the Center for Nanoscale Science & Engineering (CNSE) at North Dakota State University in Fargo. In his new position, which he started last September, Chrisey leads teams of faculty, staff, and students performing research on wireless-sensor design and fabrication, electronics miniaturization, polymers for electronics, and protective coatings developed through combinatorial materials research. He is also serving as a research professor in nanoscience and technology at NDSU. Previously he was a senior member of the technical staff at the US Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, DC.

Chiow San Wong, a physics professor at the University of Malaya, has won a Science and Technology Award from the Malaysia Toray Science Foundation. Wong received the honor, which was accompanied by a cash prize of 30 000 Malaysian ringgits (about $7955) for contributing to the enhancement of scientific knowledge, according to the foundation. The awards ceremony was held 28 November in Kuala Lumpur.