Michael Levine is a Professor of Molecular and Cell Biology at the University of California, Berkeley, and is also Co-Director at the Center for Integrative Genomics. He received his B.A. from the Department of Genetics at U.C. Berkeley, and his Ph.D. with Alan Garen in the Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry from Yale Universityin 1981. As a postdoctoral fellow with Walter Gehring and Gerry Rubin from 1982-1984, he studied the molecular genetics of Drosophila development. Professor Levine's research group currently studies the gene networks responsible for the gastrulation of the Drosophila these two species should be italicized and Ciona (sea squirt) embryos. He holds the F. Williams Chair in Genetics and Development at U.C. Berkeley. He was awarded the Monsanto Prize in Molecular Biology from the National Academy of Sciences in 1996, and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1996 and the National Academy of Sciences in 1998.