Reuters - President-elect Barack Obama on Monday chose a Nobel physics laureate to be his energy secretary and picked a former top federal environmental regulator to coordinate his energy and environmental policies.

Steven Chu, who won the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physics and now directs the government's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California, will head the Energy Department.

Chu will work closely with Carol Browner, the former head of the Environmental Protection Agency under Bill Clinton, who Obama said will coordinate White House policy on energy, and climate change among the various federal agencies.

Obama also named Lisa Jackson, the chief of staff for New Jersey's governor, to lead the EPA and Nancy Sutley, a deputy mayor of Los Angeles, to head the White House Council on Environmental Quality.

Obama's energy and environmental team will play a major role in his goal of reviving the U.S. economy by boosting renewable energy use and creating millions of "green" jobs that will ease America's addiction to foreign oil.