Marye Anne Fox, a respected chemist who ran into controversy with faculty members as chancellor of North Carolina State University, has been nominated to be the next chancellor of the University of California at San Diego.

The president of the University of California system, Robert C. Dynes, said Friday that he had chosen Ms. Fox for the San Diego job, which he held until last October. He has asked the system's Board of Regents to meet on April 12 to ratify her appointment. Mr. Dynes was San Diego's chancellor for eight years, until he became the system's president last fall.

Ms. Fox, 56, "is widely regarded as a fine teacher and mentor, a dedicated researcher, and a seasoned administrator of a large and active public research institution," Mr. Dynes wrote in a message to the San Diego campus. He said he regretted having to disclose his choice before the board had voted to confirm it, but he had learned that news of his decision had been leaked to a North Carolina newspaper.

If approved by the board, Ms. Fox would take the helm at San Diego in July. Mick Kulikowski, a spokesman for Ms. Fox, said on Tuesday that she declined to comment until the board's vote.

An organic chemist who earned her doctorate at Dartmouth College, Ms. Fox brought strong experience as a scholar and researcher when she became the first female chancellor of North Carolina State, in 1998. She had previously served as vice president for research for four years at the University of Texas at Austin, after nearly three decades as a chemistry professor there. In 2001 she was appointed to President Bush's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.

The chairwoman of North Carolina State's Board of Trustees, Peaches Gunter Blank, praised Ms. Fox's leadership in helping the university improve its scholarship and foster partnerships with private research companies. "Marye Anne wove energy, innovation, and the drive to excel into the fabric of this institution," Ms. Blank said in a written statement on Sunday.

But Ms. Fox also clashed with faculty members and academic administrators over what they saw as her autocratic leadership style. The university's Faculty Senate voted last year to censure Ms. Fox, "in the strongest possible terms," for "a serious lack of judgment" in her abrupt firing of two senior administrators and for the subsequent resignation of the provost, who stepped down in protest of her actions.

Ms. Fox said at the time that the dismissals were in response to a review of her performance as chancellor that had identified "weakness" in the provost's office.

But her boss, Molly C. Broad, president of the University of North Carolina system, gave her a stern warning to deal with the concerns expressed by the faculty members. Their vote "sends a troublesome signal that, if not addressed, will interfere with her ability to realize the long-term success of the campus," Ms. Broad said in a written statement last year.

Joni Worthington, a spokeswoman for Ms. Broad, said on Tuesday that during the past year, Ms. Fox "has done quite a bit of work to repair those relationships with her faculty, and to improve and make changes in her management style."