President Charles M. Vest has been appointed to President George W. Bush's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST).
Vest served on President Clinton's Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology from 1993 to 2001.
The council's 24 members, most of whom are academics or executives of high-tech firms, met with Bush for the first time on Wednesday in an administrative session at the White House.
John Marburger, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, said a subcommittee would study ways to combat terrorism, including how to develop better detectors for biological weapons, better baggage scanners and better systems for sanitizing contaminated mail.
Other subcommittees will advise Bush on federal investments in science and technology, energy efficiency and broadband deployment.
While the initial meeting was held behind closed doors, the council's quarterly regular meetings will be open to the public.
Other members of PCAST are Charles Joel Arntzen, chair of the Plant Biology Department at Arizona State University; Norman R. Augustine, former chair and CEO of Lockheed Martin Corp.; Carol Ann Bartz, president and CEO of Autodesk Inc.; M. Kathleen Behrens, managing director of Robertson, Stephens and Co.; Erich Bloch, former director of the National Science Foundation; Stephen B. Burke, president of Comcast Cable Communications; Gerald Wayne Clough, president of the Georgia Institute of Technology; Michael S. Dell, chair and CEO of Dell Computer Corp.; Raul Fernandez, president, chair and CEO of Proxicom Inc.; Mary Anne Fox, chancellor of North Carolina State University; Martha Gilliland, chancellor of the University of Missouri at Kansas City; Ralph E. Gomory, president of the Alfred E. Sloan Foundation; Bernadine Patricia Healy, outgoing president of the American Red Cross and former director of the National Institutes of Health; Robert J. Herbold, executive vice president of Microsoft Corp.; Barbara Kilberg, president of the Northern Virginia Technology Council; Walter E. Massey, president of Morehouse College; Gordon E. Moore, chair emeritus of Intel Corp.; E. Kenneth Nwabueze, CEO of SageMetrics; Steven G. Papermaster, chair of Powershift Group; Luis M. Proenza, president of the University of Akron; and George M. Scalise, president of the Semiconductor Industry Association.
A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on December 19, 2001.
