Daily News Briefs

Adept Technology Inc., a Livermore, Calif.-based manufacturer of factory automation components for the automotive, electronics, telecommunications, medical device and life sciences, semiconductor and fiber optic industries announced that its board of directors has appointed the following as officers of the corporation: John Dulchinos, vice president, robotics; Lee Blake, vice president, service operations; Gordon Deans, vice president, business development/general and manager, Adept Canada; Michael Overby, vice president, finance/chief accounting officer; and Joachim Melis, vice president, Europe. . . . The Directed Energy Professional Society in Albuquerque, N.M., has been awarded a grant for $1,145,880 by the Air Force Research Laboratory's Directed Energy Directorate. The society will use the grant, to be disbursed over a five-year period, to set up and operate an educational outreach program for the High Energy Laser Joint Technology Office, a military service organization also in Albuquerque. Under the grant, the society will manage a summer intern program that will attract students to high-energy laser research activities and will produce educational products relating to high-energy lasers for kindergarten through graduate school levels. It will also develop professional education short courses on high-energy laser subjects, potentially at various sites around the country.