POTSDAM – Philip K. Hopke, Clarkson University's Bayard D. Clarkson Distinguished Professor, director of Clarkson's Institute for a Sustainable Environment and director of Clarkson's Center for Air Resources Engineering & Science (CARES), has been provisionally appointed to the Board of Environmental Studies and Toxicology (BEST) of the National Research Council (NRC).

The NRC functions under the auspices of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine.

BEST is the NRC's principal study unit for environmental pollution problems affecting human health, human impacts on the environment, and the assessment and management of related risks to human health and the environment. Its overall mission is to improve the scientific and technical basis for environmental decision making and public understanding of environmental issues.

Hopke was named inaugural director of the Institute for a Sustainable Environment in June, when it was reorganized from Clarkson's Center for the Environment, which he had directed since December. Hopke has served for nearly a decade as director of CARES, which fosters research in air sampling and analysis, receptor modeling, atmospheric deposition, and the application of computational fluid dynamics to air pollution problems.