Uri Alon is a Professor

Professor

A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...

 and Systems Biologist

Systems biology

Systems biology is a term used to describe a number of trends in bioscience research, and a movement which draws on those trends. Proponents describe systems biology as a biology-based inter-disciplinary study field that focuses on complex interactions in biological systems, claiming that it uses...

 at the Weizmann Institute of Science

Weizmann Institute of Science

The Weizmann Institute of Science , known as Machon Weizmann, is a university and research institute in Rehovot, Israel. It differs from other Israeli universities in that it offers only graduate and post-graduate studies in the sciences....

. His highly cited research investigates gene expression

Gene expression

Gene expression is the process by which information from a gene is used in the synthesis of a functional gene product. These products are often proteins, but in non-protein coding genes such as ribosomal RNA , transfer RNA or small nuclear RNA genes, the product is a functional RNA...

, network motif

Network motif

Network motifs are connectivity-patterns that occur much more often than they do in random networks. Most networks studied in biology, ecology and other fields have been found to show a small set of network motifs; surprisingly, in most cases the networks seem to be largely composed of these...

s and the design principles of biological networks in Escherichia coli

Escherichia coli

Escherichia coli is a Gram-negative, rod-shaped bacterium that is commonly found in the lower intestine of warm-blooded organisms . Most E. coli strains are harmless, but some serotypes can cause serious food poisoning in humans, and are occasionally responsible for product recalls...

and other organisms using both computational biology

Computational biology

Computational biology involves the development and application of data-analytical and theoretical methods, mathematical modeling and computational simulation techniques to the study of biological, behavioral, and social systems...

 and traditional experimetal wet laboratory

Wet laboratory

Wet laboratories are laboratories where chemicals, drugs, or other material or biological matter are handled in liquid solutions or volatile phases, requiring direct ventilation, and specialized piped utilities...

 techniques.

Education and Research

Alon earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Hebrew University of Jerusalem

The Hebrew University of Jerusalem ; ; abbreviated HUJI) is Israel's second-oldest university, after the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. The Hebrew University has three campuses in Jerusalem and one in Rehovot. The world's largest Jewish studies library is located on its Edmond J...

 and his Ph.D.

Ph.D.

A Ph.D. is a Doctor of Philosophy, an academic degree.Ph.D. may also refer to:* Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*Piled Higher and Deeper, a web comic strip*PhD: Phantasy Degree, a Korean comic series* PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...

 in Theoretical Physics

Theoretical physics

Theoretical physics is a branch of physics which employs mathematical models and abstractions of physics to rationalize, explain and predict natural phenomena...

 from the Weizmann Institute of Science

Weizmann Institute of Science

The Weizmann Institute of Science , known as Machon Weizmann, is a university and research institute in Rehovot, Israel. It differs from other Israeli universities in that it offers only graduate and post-graduate studies in the sciences....

. After having his interest in biology sparked, he headed for his postdoctoral work at Princeton University

Princeton University

Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....

 in experimental biology returning to the Weizmann Institute as a Professor.

In 2004 Alon was awarded the Overton Prize

Overton Prize

The Overton Prize is an annual prize is awarded for outstanding accomplishment to a scientist in the early to mid stage of his or her career who has already made a significant contribution to the field of computational biology either through research, education, service, or a combination of the three...

 for "outstanding accomplishment by a scientist in the early to mid stage of his or her career" by the International Society for Computational Biology.

Alon features in several popular videos on YouTube such as Sunday at the Lab and How to Give a Good Talk. As of 2011, he is the author of the most highly bookmarked scientific paper on CiteULike

CiteULike

CiteULike is based on the principle of social bookmarking and is aimed to promote and to develop the sharing of scientific references amongst researchers. In the same way that it is possible to catalog web pages or photographs , scientists can share information on academic papers with specific...

How To Choose a Good Scientific Problem and How to Build a Motivated Research Group