Steven Chu

US President-elect Barack Obama is expected to nominate Steven Chu, a prominent Chinese- American scientist for energy secretary, major US media outlets reported Wednesday.

Obama will also pick Lisa Jackson for environmental protection agency (EPA) administrator and former Clinton administration EPA Director Carol Browner as his energy "czar".

Chu, whose father came from China, is director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and a co-winner of the 1997 Nobel Prize in physics.

Jackson is the head of the Department of Environmental Protection in New Jersey, where she has earned mixed reviews.

The formal announcements will be made in the coming weeks, according to news reports.

Meanwhile, media reports said Obama will formally nominate former Senate leader Tom Daschle to be secretary for health and human services on Thursday.

(Xinhua News Agency December 11, 2008)