Françoise Barré-Sinoussi became the new president of the International AIDS Society (IAS) when the XIX International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2012) in Washington, DC, closed on July 27, according to an IAS statement. Barré-Sinoussi, a French virologist, was awarded the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for her role in the discovery of HIV in 1983. She will serve as president for the next two years and will be chair of the 7th IAS Conference on HIV Pathogenesis, Treatment and Prevention (IAS 2013) and the XX International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2014). Chris Beyrer, MD, MPH, professor of epidemiology at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, is the new IAS president-elect.

To read the IAS statement, click here.