President-elect Obama's choice of Nobel prize-winning physicist Steven Chu to be his energy secretary bodes well for the future of the underground science laboratory in Lead, according to the governor and the lab's top South Dakota scientist.

"To have the head of the Department of Energy be familiar with and supportive of the project, that sure can't hurt us," Gov. Mike Rounds said Thursday of the apparent selection of Chu to the new administration's cabinet. Obama is expected to name Chu and the rest of his energy and environmental team in the coming weeks.

Chu was in South Dakota in late September, visiting the Sanford Underground Laboratory in the former Homestake gold mine and hosting a symposium at South Dakota School of Mines & Technology on the National Science Foundation's proposed Deep Underground Science and Engineering Laboratory, or DUSEL.

School of Mines professor Bill Roggenthen, a co-principal investigator for DUSEL and its top researcher in South Dakota, agreed with Rounds.

"The choice of Dr. Steven Chu bodes well for science, South Dakota, and the underground laboratory in Lead," Roggenthen said. "During his visit to SDSM&T and the laboratory this fall, he was extremely interested in the progress of the laboratory and appreciated its importance to high energy physics, as well as the other underground experiments that will occupy the laboratory."

As the director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory since 2004, Chu also deserves credit for helping launch the underground lab project in Lead, Rounds said. He is the individual who first authorized Berkeley Laboratory scientist Kevin Lesko to spend time leading a collaboration of scientists who wanted to develop the DUSEL at the Homestake site. Lesko is DUSEL's co-principal investigator from Berkeley.

"Dr. Chu was his boss, and he had the support of Dr. Chu," Rounds said. "He allowed Lesko to work on a project that, at the time, a lot of people didn't think had much of a chance of getting off the ground. And now, we are not only off the ground, we are deep underground."

Rounds said he found Chu fascinating during a short but enriching conversation in September. "He's very bright, very articulate, very approachable. He's a motivator, and he clearly understands the need to share science in a fun fashion and in an outreach to children," Rounds said. "He's clearly not a political person. He is a policy person."

Chu, 60, shared the 1997 Nobel Prize for physics for his work in the development of methods to cool and trap atoms with laser light. Roggenthen said he was optimistic that an Energy Department led by Chu would mean good things for the development of alternative energy sources.

Chu is known as an advocate for finding scientific solutions to climate change. Under his leadership, the Berkeley Lab has become the world leader in alternative and renewable energy research, particularly the development of carbon-neutral sources of energy.

"He showed great interest in exploring how South Dakota researchers could collaborate with researchers from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in this field of underground science and engineering and also in the fields related to non-conventional energy sources," Roggenthen said.

Rounds wouldn't speculate on what Chu's appointment might mean for the future of wind energy or the ethanol industry in South Dakota but said he was relieved to have a scientist in the top energy job.

"My first reaction was it's nice to see a person that looks at facts and believes in science, as opposed to perception. If we could get more people in Washington, D.C., to base their decisions on facts instead of on perceptions, this country would be in a lot better shape."