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White House Recognizes Promising Research
by Sarah Lai Stirland with William New
The White House last week awarded its 2003 Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers to 57 researchers across eight federal government departments and agencies.
The award is the nation's highest honor for science professionals at the beginning of their research careers. Among the recipients were two researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and six Defense Department researchers. Award recipients are given up to five years of funding to support their work at their agencies.
At NIST, Scott Diddams won an award for his work in developing and applying new laser techniques to measure, with new levels of accuracy, the frequency of electromagnetic radiation. His NIST colleague, Jon Pratt, won an award for innovations in the fields of fundamental measurement science, manufacturing research and precision engineering.
The technology industry relies on NIST to develop industry standards and measurement techniques that enable new industries to flourish.
Researchers at the University of Arizona, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Chicago, and Michigan Technological University were among the recipients of the award on behalf of the Defense Department.
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was on hand for the White House ceremony, where he joked that basketball legend Michael Jordan's middle-school teacher advised Jordan to give up basketball to focus on math because "that was where the money was." Wolfowitz said his father, who was a statistician at Columbia University, would have agreed. The university's statistical research group devised mathematical solutions for optimal submarine search patterns in the Atlantic during World War II.
At the ceremony, Wolfowitz said he considered pursuing a doctorate in chemistry at MIT but opted instead for political science. Still, he lauded the role of science and technology in modern society. He attributed America's ultimate dominance in the Cold War to the nation's technological and scientific superiority.
"I think it could be argued correctly that it was science and technology that eventually forced the Soviet Union to face up to the failure of its own system," he said. Pointing to technology's role in the current war against terrorism, Wolfowitz said that it "allowed us to win two brilliant military victories, first in Afghanistan and then in Iraq."
Defense last week also welcomed its equivalent of a new chief financial officer. Tina Jonas officially joined the department Wednesday as undersecretary of defense, comptroller. Jonas was sworn in July 28 after the Senate confirmed her appointment a week earlier. Before joining the Defense Department, Jonas was an assistant director and chief financial officer for the FBI.
Also last week, President Bush appointed a group of six telecommunications executives to be members of his National Security Telecommunications Advisory Committee. They are: Verizon Communications Vice Chairman and President Lawrence Babio; Motorola Executive Vice President Gregory Brown; Science Applications International Corp. CEO and President Ken Dahlberg; AT&T President William Hannigan; Cingular Wireless President and CEO Stan Sigman; and PanAmSat President and CEO Joseph Wright.
New Muscle In Brussels For Cisco
Laura Ipsen, Cisco Systems' vice president of worldwide governmental affairs, announced that Monique Meche has joined the company as managing director for Cisco's government affairs office in Brussels, Belgium.
Meche, who will report to Ipsen, spent nine years in Intel's government units in the United States, Europe and Japan. A staff of three located in Brussels, Germany and France will report to her.
Elsewhere in industry, the Computer Systems Policy (CSPP) Project announced that Mike Splinter, CEO of the semiconductor giant Applied Materials, has joined the organization.
CSPP is comprised of technology company CEOs who check in with federal policymakers twice a year on issues that are important to the industry. The other CEO members are Kevin Rollins of Dell, Joseph Tucci of EMC, Carly Fiorina of Hewlett-Packard, Samuel Palmisano of IBM, Craig Barrett of Intel, Ed Zander of Motorola, Mark Hurd of NCR and Lawrence Weinbach of Unisys.
CongressDaily, meanwhile, reports that Hillary Brill's last day as legislative counsel for Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Va., was Friday. She is heading to the presidential campaign of Democrat John Kerry to work on technology policy, but in the next month or so, she'll start a new job in eBay's Washington office as its first legislative counsel.
"I'll be the only [official] attorney in the office," Brill said. That's got to be a Washington first.
Boucher's office has not yet replaced Brill.
And the FCC announced last week that it has hired Mark Wigfield, a reporter in the Washington bureau of Dow Jones Newswires, as a wireline liaison specialist. Wigfield will field press inquiries and handle public affairs for the Wireline Competition Bureau. He spent five years at Dow Jones, where his beat included the FCC, Congress and executive branch agencies. He covered communications policy, the technology industry and antitrust issues.
What's In A Name?
Despite the attention Capitol Hill has paid to homeland security funding and infrastructure protection, Robert Liscouski [pronounced Lis-kow-ski], the top Homeland Security official for critical infrastructure protection, is still a relative unknown to some congressional committees.
At a hearing last week on the security of finance infrastructures, members of the House Financial Services Committee were familiar enough with his work to criticize Liscouski for departmental shortcomings but not familiar enough with him personally to pronounce his name correctly.
The committee's vice chairwoman, Sue Kelly, R-N.Y, introduced him as Robert "Liscorski." Judy Biggert, R-Ill., tried her own pronunciation, calling him Liscorski but then switching moments later to "Lewinsky."
Iowa Republican Jim Leach safely dodged the issue by simply referring to "our third witness." The other two were the better-known Federal Reserve Board member Mark Olson and Treasury Department Assistant Secretary Wayne Abernathy.
Finally, Barbara Lee, D-Calif., decided to settle the matter, asking him, "Liscouski, Liskooski?" to which Liscouski replied calmly, "I've been called a lot of things so far."
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