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CORVALLIS - Jane Lubchenco, the Valley Professor of Marine Biology and a distinguished professor of zoology at Oregon State University, has been elected a Foreign Member of the Royal Society of London, which is the national academy of science for the United Kingdom.

The Fellowship of the Royal Society includes about 1,240 members and 125 foreign members who are considered the most distinguished scientists in the world, and this year 50 new members or foreign members joined the group, which was founded in 1660. Election is for life and recognizes scientific excellence. Current members and foreign members include 60 Nobel laureates. Previous fellows include such scientific giants as Isaac Newton, Christopher Wren, Charles Darwin, Ernest Rutherford and Dorothy Hodgkin.

Lubchenco was recognized as "an outstanding environmental scientist and marine ecologist with very broad interests in understanding the natural dynamics of the Earth's ecosystems and developing new approaches to understanding the functioning of ecological systems."

Lubchenco is also a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society, some of the other most prestigious scientific academies in the world. She has been on the OSU faculty since 1976.

"These outstanding individuals are very welcome additions to the fellowship and foreign membership of the Royal Society," said Lord May of Oxford, president of the Royal Society. "The achievements of these individuals demonstrate just how strong science is in the United Kingdom and Commonwealth. We hope they will contribute to the wide range of activities that the Royal Society undertakes, and provide leadership for the scientific community, both in the UK and abroad."