Chicago, Dec. 16 : US President-elect Barack Obama on Monday announced his energy and environmental teams.

Steven Chu, who shared the Nobel Prize for physics 11 years ago, was tapped to be Obama''s secretary of the Department of Energy.

He is currently the head of the Berkeley National Laboratory and is a specialist in carbon-neutral energy sources.

Obama said Chu was "uniquely suited" to serve in his Cabinet.

Chicago, Dec. 14 : US President-elect Barack Obama has been using his four minutes of weekend airtime not only to speak directly to the American people, but also to create news.

According to the Washington Post, Obama used the address to announce Shaun Donovan, New York City''s housing commissioner, as his nominee to head the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Obama has previously outlined a series of specific proposals aimed at reversing the nation''s economic torpor, and he sketched out a plan to save or create 2.5 million jobs over the next two years.

Chicago, Dec. 13 : US President-elect Barack Obama''s economic team is considering an economic-stimulus program that could be in excess of 600 billion dollars to be used over a period of two years.

According to a Wall Street Journal report, sources close to the Obama camp said with the unemployment rate now expected to hit nine percent without aggressive intervention, Obama aides and advisers have set $600 billion over two years as "a very low-end estimate."

The final number is expected to be significantly higher, possibly between 700 billion dollars and a trillion dollars over two years.

Chicago, Dec. 13: Rahm Emanuel, US President-elect Barack Obama's designated Chief of Staff, is reportedly facing claims that he had repeated conversations with Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, who has been accused of trying to sell Obama''s US Senate seat.

Sources close to the investigation were quoted by The Telegraph as saying that Emanuelhad conversations about the issue with both Blagojevich and his chief of staff John Harris, who is also facing corruption charges.

Chicago, Dec. 13: Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan has asked the State Supreme Court to grant a temporary restraining order barring Governor Rod Blagojevich from completing state business and declaring him unfit to serve.

Blagojevich faces federal charges of trying to sell President-elect Barack Obamas now-vacant Senate seat, bribing The Chicago Tribune to get rid of an editorial writer who criticized him and participating in other "pay to play" tactics.