Vernon P. Roan chairs the Review of the FreedomCAR and Fuel Research and Development Program for the National Research Council. Dr. Roan is the retired director of the Center for Advanced Studies in Engineering and professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Florida, where he has been a faculty member for more than 30 years. He has been a consultant to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory monitoring their electric and hybrid vehicle programs. He has organized and chaired two national meetings on advanced vehicle technologies and a national seminar on the development of fuel-cell-powered automobiles and has published numerous technical papers on innovative propulsion systems. He is currently a member of the Expert Panel on Zero Emission Vehicles for CARB. Dr. Roan received his B.S. in aeronautical engineering and his M.S. in engineering from the University of Florida and his Ph.D. in engineering from the University of Illinois.