The Trustees of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute have elected Craig A. Alexander as the Institute’s vice president and general counsel. He will assume the new role in January 2006.

Alexander, 46, has served as HHMI’s deputy general counsel since 1994. He succeeds Joan Leonard, who is retiring as general counsel after 11 years in that post. Leonard will assume a new role as senior counsel to the Institute’s president, Thomas R. Cech.

“Over the past decade, Craig has been Joan Leonard’s active collaborator and partner in managing the Office of the General Counsel. His broad legal expertise and deep familiarity with HHMI make him uniquely qualified for this new assignment,” said Cech.

As deputy general counsel, Alexander played a major role in the formulation and implementation of HHMI’s policies on intellectual property, in providing legal advice concerning the investment of the endowment, and in guiding the development of the Janelia Farm Research Campus in Ashburn, Va.

Alexander joined HHMI as an associate general counsel in 1992 from the Indianapolis law firm of Sommer & Barnard, P.C. Before that, he had handled many matters involving HHMI while an associate in the Washington, D.C., office of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison.

A magna cum laude graduate of the Georgetown University Law Center, where he was editor of the law journal, Alexander received a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Butler University in Indianapolis. He is also a certified public accountant. Alexander is a member of the tax, science, and technology sections of the American Bar Association; the National Association of College and University Attorneys, and a variety of other organizations.

A resident of Bethesda, Alexander and his wife have three children.