WASHINGTON, July 1: US President George W. Bush has named Frederic Mishkin, a Columbia University professor, to the Federal Reserve's board of governors, the White House said on Friday.

Mishkin, 55, is the Alfred Lerner professor of banking and financial institutions at Columbia's Graduate School of Business in New York. He currently serves on the economic advisory panel of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, according to his biography.

Mishkin co-authored, with Fed chairman Ben Bernanke and others, “Inflation Targeting: Lessons from the International Experience”, published by Princeton University in 1999.

The US government said Bush had tapped Mishkin for the remainder of a 14-year term expiring January 31, 2014.

The White House forwarded Mishkin's nomination to the Senate, saying he was named to succeed former Fed vice chairman Roger Ferguson.

The seven board of governors and five of the 12 Federal Reserve Bank presidents comprise the 12 voting members of the policy-making Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC).

The central bank has undergone a flurry of personnel changes since Bernanke became chairman six months ago.

Ferguson resigned in April and has been replaced by Donald Kohn.

On June 21, Mark Olson resigned from the board of governors to become head of a federal accounting oversight board.

The next day, Atlanta Fed chairman Jack Guynn, who is a voting member of the FOMC, announced his retirement, from October 1.

Mishkin earned a bachelor's degree and doctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

He has worked as a professor at the University of Chicago, Northwestern University in Chicago and Princeton University in New Jersey.

His research focuses on monetary policy and its impact on financial markets and the aggregate economy, according to his biography.

He has been a consultant to the seven-member Fed board of governors, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank and the International Monetary Fund, as well as to numerous foreign central banks.

Mishkin's nomination to the Fed board requires Senate approval. A governor who is appointed to complete an unexpired term may be reappointed to a full 14-year term.—AFP?