Keith J. Bowman has been appointed head of Purdue University’s School of Materials Engineering, effective Dec. 31. Bowman, a professor of materials engineering with another appointment in the Department of Engineering Education, replaces Alexander H. King, who will become director of Ames Laboratory in Ames, Iowa. Bowman has taught and conducted research at Purdue's West Lafayette, Ind., campus since 1988 and was promoted to full professor in 1996. He was acting head of the department in 2005-06 while King was on leave with the US Department of State. In 1995 Bowman received Purdue’s highest teaching award, the Charles Murphy Undergraduate Teaching Award. He received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in metallurgy and material science from Case Western University in Cleveland and his doctorate in materials science and engineering from the University of Michigan.