Joint release from PPARC and NWO: Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research 25 June 1998 12/98 Director of the ISAAC Newton Group of Telescopes, La Palma Dr Rene Rutten has been appointed as Director of the Isaac Newton Group of Telescopes on La Palma in the Canary Islands. Dr Rutten, aged 39, is from the Netherlands Foundation for Research in Astronomy and has been working at the Universities of Utrecht and Amsterdam. He has been acting Director since November 1997. Before that he was the Head of Astronomy of the ING. His scientific interests cover the observational study of magnetic fields on solar-type stars, and accretion processes in interacting binaries. Dr Rutten's appointment is a joint appointment for five years by the UK and the Netherlands which provide the Isaac Newton Group of telescopes for the astronomers of their communities and Spain, as well as Ireland and Portugal. The appointment was as recommended by the UK/NL Joint Steering Committee (JSC). The JSC, at the same meeting, accepted a report on the ING by a Visiting Panel chaired by Dr. R Cannon (Anglo Australian Observatory). Accordingly, the JSC decided: to establish a joint programme of research at the ING by appointing (on a competitive basis) La Palma Research Fellows; to support the UK in a request to Spain for an option to participate in the 8 metre telescope project Gran Telescopio de Canarias, to be established on La Palma by the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias; to re-establish the joint programme of instrumentation for the ING by means of coordinated programmes in the UK and Netherlands, and eventually perhaps with the Gran Telescopio de Canarias. Note The Isaac Newton Group (ING) consists of the 4.2m William Herschel Telescope, the 2.5m Isaac Newton Telescope and the 1m Jacobus Kapteyn Telescope. The telescopes are owned and operated jointly by the UK's Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council and the Netherlands' Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (NWO), which have established the UK/NL Joint Steering Committee as their governing body. Among recent astronomical highlights from the telescopes were the first identification of the optical outburst of a gamma ray burster, leading to its location in a distant galaxy. The telescopes are located in the Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos on La Palma at a height of 2400m. The internationalised observatory belongs to the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias, which will establish its 8m telescope near to the ING. Press information: Charlotte Allen, PPARC press office Tel: 01793 442012 e-mail: charlotte_allen@pparc.ac.uk Photograph: A photograph of Dr Rene Rutten can be found at the following site: http://www.ing.iac.es/