Filippo Giorgi, a member of the ICTP Physics of Weather and Climate group, has been included in the Institute for Scientific Information's (ISI) list of Highly Cited Researchers. Based on ISI's citation index, the world's most authoritative index for measuring the impact of publications, Giorgi is included among the 295 most cited researchers in geoscience, placing him in the top 0.5 percent of the most cited researchers in his field. Massimo Altarelli has been promoted to the post of Senior Scientific Director of Elettra Synchrotron Light Laboratory. Altarelli, who came to Trieste in 1999 under a joint appointment with Elettra and ICTP, had previously worked at the physics department of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, USA; the Max Planck Institute in Stuttgart, Germany; and the High Magnetic Field Laboratory and European Synchrotron Radiation Facility in Grenoble, France. Le Dung Trang, head of the ICTP Mathematics group, has received an honorary degree of sciences from the Vietnamese Academy of Sciences and Technology (VAST). Le Dung Trang is being recognised for his contributions to the development of education and science in Vietnam. The awards ceremony will take place in Vietnam this month.