N-1-2-040.30 Internet Research Task Force (IRTF) by Jon Postel*, The Internet Activities Board (IAB) has appointed Jon Postel of USC's Information Sciences Institute as the new head of the Internet Research Task Force and its coordinating committee, the IRSG. Jon has been an active member of the Internet research community since its beginnings, and before that played a major role in defining the ARPANET protocols. As "protocol czar", he finalized the specifications of such protocols as TCP, IP, and SMTP. As RFC Editor, he has been responsible for the editorial and technical quality of the RFC series of notes. Jon takes over from Dave Clark of MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science. Dave has chaired the IRTF from its beginning, and has made many contributions to the research groups. The IRTF is composed of research groups including: The Autonomous Networks Research Group chaired by Deborah Estrin of USC, The End-to-End Services Research Group chaired by Bob Braden of ISI, the Resource Discovery and Directory Services Research Group chaired by Mike Schwartz of University of Colorado, the Privacy and Security Research Group chaired by Steve Kent of BBN, and a Research Group chaired by Cliff Lynch of the University of California, Office of the President. The IRSG is composed of the chairs of these research groups as well as Dave Mills of the University of Delaware, Bruce Schatz of the University of Arizona, and Dave Clark of MIT as members at large. * Communications Division Director, Information Sciences Institute, University of Southern California