AP Photo/Seth Wenig
Departing Cornell University President David Skorton speaks at a 2012 event announcing a partnership with Google.
"In selecting David, the Smithsonian has acknowledged what we at Cornell already know - that David is that rare leader who can guide a great institution to even greater achievement. They could not have made a better choice," Cornell Board of Trustees Chairman Robert Harrison said in a statement.
According to the university, Harrison will soon select the members for a search committee to find Cornell's 13th president.
Skorton took over at Cornell in 2006, after a three-year term as the University of Iowa's president. Among his biggest accomplishments at Cornell was winning a New York City graduate engineering and technology campus for the Ithaca-based school.
"Becoming a part of the Smithsonian is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to lead an institution that is at the heart of the country's cultural, artistic, historical and scientific life," Skorton said in a Smithsonian statement. A board-certified cardiologist, Skorton will be the first physician to lead the Smithsonian.