The first South American international physics and mathematics center will be set up in Argentina and start work in 2006, a government official said on Saturday.

Fidel Schaposnik, a researcher from La Plata National University, will be director of the center which is financially supported by all South American countries.

The establishment of the center is part of the activities of the international year of physics, which marks the centenary of the publication of Albert Einstein's theory of relativity.