(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) — Robin Hansen, a professor of pediatrics at UC Davis and founding director of the Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities at the UC Davis MIND Institute, has been appointed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to the California State Council on Developmental Disabilities.

The 29-member council is an independent state agency charged with ensuring that people with developmental disabilities and their families receive the services and supports they need from the state Department of Developmental Disabilities and the state Regional Centers in order to be included in their communities.

The Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities (CEDD) is one of 67 federally funded centers nationwide that link the resources of the university with the community to improve the lives of individuals with developmental disabilities through education, research and service.

Hansen is fellowship director and section chief of developmental and behavioral pediatrics, and director of clinical programs at the MIND Institute. She also serves as an associate editor of the Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics and just completed her term as president of the Society for Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics.

The UC Davis MIND Institute, in Sacramento, Calif., was founded in 1998 as a unique interdisciplinary research center where parents, community leaders, researchers, clinicians and volunteers collaborate to study and treat autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders. More information about the institute and the CEDD is available on the Web at www.ucdmc.ucdavis.edu/mindinstitute/ and http://www.ucdmc.ucdavis.edu/ddcenter/