Marco Leona has been appointed Scientist in Charge of the Museum's newly formed Science Group and will join the Museum in January 2004. Marco received his doctorate in crystallography and mineralogy at the University of Pavia (Italy) in 1995. Before taking up his current position as Senior Conservation Scientist at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, he was Research Scientist at the Freer Gallery of Art/Arthur M. Sackler Gallery. His work includes various studies of artists' materials and techniques, ranging from the introduction of European pigments in Edo period Japan, to the use of colored glazes and selective coatings in Tibetan thangka paintings, to the spectroscopic characterization of the pre-Columbian pigment Maya blue.

The Science Group will bring together Museum scientists Silvia Centeno, James H. Frantz, Robert J. Koestler, Nobuko Shibayama, George Wheeler, and Mark T. Wypyski, currently members of different conservation departments, in order to integrate and expand the Museum's capabilities for scientific analysis and research.