Director's Corner

30 March 2006

Barry Barish

Thanks, Fumi... Welcome, Mitsuaki

It is my great pleasure to announce the appointment of Professor Mitsuaki Nozaki of Kobe University of Japan as the new GDE Asian Regional Director, succeeding Professor Fumihiko Takasaki.

Professor Mitsuaki Nozaki

Following my appointment as GDE director one year ago, the first key appointments I made were the three regional directors: Brian Foster for Europe, Gerry Dugan for the Americas and Fumihiko Takasaki for Asia. Our three regional directors were given the charge of coordinating the programs within the GDE for Europe, Asia and the Americas and helping implement the projects and priorities within those regions. We have been very fortunate to have three outstanding regional directors.

As we developed a globally conceived "baseline configuration" last year, the regional directors played a critical role in insuring that our processes were truly global, regional interests were understood, and we balanced the global needs and priorities against regional interests. Balancing these interests is a crucial element in developing a truly global design, a global R&D program and international management for the International Linear Collider.

As regional coordinator for Asia, Fumihiko Takasaki played a crucial role in developing the Asian GDE effort over the past year. The Asian ILC and GDE efforts include an ambitious and growing R&D program at KEK, strong participation in the GDE Baseline and RDR efforts, and a broadening participation in the GDE and ILC. Fumi has been energetic and instrumental both in developing the Asian regional program, and in serving as a member of the GDE Executive Committee, where our top level global policy decisions are made.

I have very much valued Fumi's role on the GDE Executive Committee and we have relied on his advice. Unfortunately for us, Fumi's great talents are also well recognized at home, and he has been appointed as the directorship of Institute of Particle and Nuclear Studies (IPNS) at KEK as of 1 April 2006. In this new position, he will no longer be able to serve as the Asian Regional GDE Director. I wish him well in his new position, and am confident he will do an outstanding job.

Our new Asian Regional Coordinator, Mitsuaki Nozaki, is the chair of the Japanese High Energy Physics Committee (JHEPC). Mitsuaki will be moving from Kobe to KEK, where he will become a Professor and the Deputy Director of Institute of Particle and Nuclear Studies (IPNS), as well as serving in his new role in the GDE. His GDE role will build on a long term research involvement with high energy collider experiments, previously having been a collaborator on JADE at PETRA-DESY, OPAL at LEP-CERN and ATLAS at LHC-CERN. In addition, Mitsuaki's broad interests have included involvement in an important cosmic rays experiment, BESS, which has performed a sensitive search for cosmic antimatter.

I want to warmly welcome Mitsuaki Nozaki to the GDE and personally state that I very much look forward to working closely with him, as we move forward on our mission of developing a global design for the ILC.