OFFICE OF THE CHANCELLOR
November 21, 1997
ALL AT UCSD
SUBJECT: Appointment of VC-Marine Sciences, Director of SIO, & Dean of the Graduate School of Marine Sciences
Charles F. Kennel, a physicist and Executive Vice Chancellor at UCLA, has been selected to serve as Vice Chancellor - Marine Sciences, as well as Director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Dean of the Graduate School of Marine Sciences, and a professor in the Scripps Graduate Department at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). The appointment was approved by the University of California Board of Regents today, November 21.
Charles Kennel succeeds Edward Allan Frieman who retired from the position in August 1996 after serving 10 years. "Charles Kennel is a stellar scientist who has made significant 
contributions to science policy at the national level, which positions him well 
to provide strong leadership for ushering Scripps Institution into the next 
century of oceanographic research," said Dynes.
I am truly honored to be selected to serve as director of the world's
greatest institution of its kind," Kennel said.  "As I contemplate embarking on the challenge of leading Scripps Institution of Oceanography I do so with the full realization that its greatness lies in the intelligence, creativity, and dedication of its men and women. I look forward to working with them in the area of global environmental science, which I came to love while at NASA."
     
Charles Kennel's research at UCLA has focused on fundamental plasma physics 
combined with space and astrophysics. His work has centered on basic plasma 
turbulence theory and collisionless shocks, the physics of the solar wind and 
planetary magnetospheres, and the physics of pulsar magnetospheres and active 
galactic nuclei. From 1994-96, Dr. Kennel served as associate administrator 
for NASA's Mission to Planet Earth program, the world's largest environmental 
science program.
     
Born in Cambridge, Mass., Charles Kennel received a bachelor's degree in 
astronomy from Harvard College in 1959 and a doctoral degree in 
astrophysical sciences from Princeton University in 1964.  He was appointed 
an associate professor of physics at UCLA in 1967 and a professor in 1971. 
Kennel became UCLA's Executive Vice Chancellor in 1996.
     
Charles Kennel was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1991.  He was 
named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 
1992. His other memberships include the American Astronomical Society, the 
American Geophysical Union, and the American Physical Society. He won the NASA 
Distinguished Service Medal and the Aurelio Peccei Prize from the Italian 
Academy of Sciences in 1996. He received the 1997 James Clerk Maxwell Prize from
the American Physical Society and was selected to receive the Hannes Alfven 
Medal of the European Geophysical Society, which will be presented in April 
1998.
     
Charles Kennel has been a Guggenheim Foundation Fellow, a Fulbright 
Senior Lecturer in Brazil, and an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellow. 
     
     
Please join me in welcoming Dr. Kennel to the campus February 1, 1998.
     
     
     
     
                                        Robert C. Dynes
                                        Chancellor