Mark McNamee, who as dean of the Division of Biological Sciences has left a far-reaching imprint at the University of California, Davis, will be leaving the campus to become provost at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.

McNamee said he was excited about new opportunities in taking on the No. 2 administrative position at Virginia Tech, a top-level research university with about 25,000 students.

"It's a wonderful place," McNamee said. "The hardest part will be leaving here."

McNamee, 54, will begin his new position in August. He leaves his UC Davis post on June 30 after 26 years, the last eight years leading the Division of Biological Sciences. A national search is being conducted for his successor.

"Chancellor Vanderhoef and I congratulate Mark on his new appointment. He has made many significant contributions to UC Davis both as a faculty member and as dean, and we are especially grateful for his outstanding leadership of the Division of Biological Sciences," said UC Davis Provost Robert Grey. "We are, of course, sorry to lose him from our campus community but we fully recognize the opportunity and challenge offered by his new position at Virginia Tech. We wish him and his family the very best."

McNamee announced a year ago his plans to step down as dean. "It was a perfect time in my life to step back and look at all the possibilities," he said. "This opportunity at Virginia Tech represents the kind of work I want to do at this stage in my career."

He said he and his wife, Carole, and their youngest daughter, Katie, 16, are looking forward to moving to Blacksburg, Va., in the scenic Shenandoah Mountains this summer. "We fell in love with the university and the region."

Virginia Tech President Charles Steger said the search committee appreciated McNamee's understanding of the role of the nation's land-grant research universities. "He has a well-seasoned perspective about universities. I was particularly impressed with his appreciation for the role of the arts and humanities in sustaining the academic vigor of a robust modern university," Steger said.

McNamee was also commended for the "unqualified high regard" of his colleagues, the difficult management decisions he had made, and the fact that he has continued his teaching and research at UC Davis while providing leadership as dean.

During job interviews across the country in recent months, McNamee said he was pleased to hear that UC Davis and its biological sciences were widely respected.

"In all of my travels, I have been pleased to see how highly regarded our programs in biological sciences have become. Many well-known universities aspire to accomplish what we have already achieved," McNamee said.

In addition to helping to shape the Division of Biological Sciences, McNamee has had a wide impact on a campus where close to half the faculty is involved in life-science programs. He has also been coordinating dean for the genomics initiative, which will lead to the recruitment of 25 new faculty members and construction of a $95 million research building. In addition, he has served as campus leader for UC Davis' partnership with The Jackson Laboratory, a Maine-based nonprofit institute that is the world's premier breeder of laboratory mice. He also chairs the Administrative Coordinating Council for Biological Sciences, which works to enhance the overall development of life sciences at UC Davis.

More than a quarter of the division's 113 faculty members were hired during McNamee's tenure as dean. Extramural funding more than doubled in that same period.

He oversaw construction of a new research building, the Life Sciences Addition, which was completed in late 1996; ongoing remodeling of Briggs Hall next door; and planning for the Sciences Laboratory Building, which will be the state's most advanced science teaching facility when it opens in 2004.

McNamee has been an administrator at UC Davis since 1990, when he became chair of what was then the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics (now the Section of Molecular and Cellular Biology).

When the Division of Biological Sciences reorganized in 1992, he chaired the faculty committee that designed its current structure -- five academic sections that report to the division and that reflect modern themes in biology. Previously, the campus had six departments in basic biology, three each in two different colleges.

Today, the division administers nine undergraduate majors in biology with more than 3,600 students -- close to 20 percent of all undergraduates on the campus -- and 12 graduate groups with more than 500 students. The division also houses the Biotechnology Program, the UC systemwide Life Sciences Informatics Program, and campuswide centers in animal behavior, genetics and development, neuroscience, and population biology.

In addition to 113 faculty members in five academic sections, the division has a staff of nearly 135 people, 110 postdoctoral fellows, and a total budget of more than $37 million.

McNamee came to Davis in 1975 as an assistant professor of biochemistry. His research focuses on the structure and function of biological membranes, with an emphasis on receptors in the nervous system. He was made professor in 1985.

He received his bachelor's of science degree from MIT in 1968, his doctoral degree in chemistry from Stanford University in 1973, then served two years as a postdoctoral associate at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons.