In a recently posted campus mail, Ray Lane - chairman of the board of trustees at the Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) - has revealed that Dr. Subra Suresh, director of the National Science Foundation (NSF), has been appointed as the new CMU president.

Dr. Suresh, 56, will be the ninth president of CMU; and - according to Lane's email which has been distributed across the 11,000-student CMU campus - has been unanimously selected for the post by a 17-member presidential search committee, which broadly represented the CMU board of trustees, esteemed faculty-members and alumni across all schools and colleges.

The new CMU president, Dr. Suresh, will succeed Dr. Jared L. Cohon, who is stepping down from the post of the president after a 16-year stint. Dr. Suresh will take over the responsibilities as the new president of the university with effect from July 1, 2013.

Noting that Dr. Suresh "is committed to interdisciplinary collaboration as the best way to solve the world's complex problems," Lane said in the email that, with his "strategic vision, international expertise and commitment to technology research and education," Dr. Suresh will further build CMU's standing as one of the world's best institutions for higher education.

In response to his appointment as the ninth CMU president, Dr, Suresh said by telephone from NSF's suburban Washington D. C. headquarters:

"It (CMU) is a great academic institution, and I'm very pleased to have the opportunity to lead it."