Science

Newsmakers

May 18, 2007

French-born astrophysicist France Córdova has been named president of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. Currently chancellor at the University of California, Riverside, Córdova is a former chief scientist at NASA who has also written award-winning fiction and a cookbook. She succeeds Martin Jischke, who is retiring in June.

Chemist Goverdhan Mehta of the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore and biologist Luis Herrera-Estrella of Mexico's National Laboratory of Genomics for Biodiversity in Irapuato have won the Trieste Science Prize from the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World. Mehta's contributions to organic synthesis have led to new hybrid cancer drugs. Herrera-Estrella's work on genetically modified crops has been a boon to Latin America. The two will share $100,000.