Walter Gilbert is a Jewish American physicist and biochemist who won the 1980 Nobel Prize for Chemistry.

Gilbert (born March 21, 1932) was was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts and attended Harvard University for undergraduate and graduate studies, earning a baccalaureate in chemistry and physics in 1953 and a master's degree in physics in 1954. He studied for his doctorate at the University of Cambridge, where he earned a Ph.D in Physics under the mentorship of Nobel laureate Abdus Salam in 1957.

Gilbert returned to teach at Harvard in 1956 and in 1969 was awarded Harvard's Ledlie Prize.

In 1980, Gilbert was a co-recipient of the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for breathroughs in molecular biology that advanced the science of genetic engineering. He formed several companies to capitalize on his discovieries: Biogen Inc. (1978), a biotechnology firm, and Genome Corp. (1987), which is currently mapping the human genetic blueprint.

Sources: Dor LeDor; Wikipedia