Philadelphia (USA), 1960

American paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, scientific popularizer, and writer of Russian descent, Neil Shubin studied at Columbia University and the University of California, Berkeley, and is currently Professor of Organ Biology and Anatomy, Associate Dean for Organ Biology and Anatomy, and Professor at the Evolutionary Biology Committee of the University of Chicago, in addition to being the rector of the Field Museum of Natural History. It is internationally known for being a co-discoverer of the Tiktaalik, a 375 million-year-old fossil fish, whose skull, limbs, fingers, feet, ankles, and wrists provide a link between fish and the oldest living creatures on earth. Upon public presentation of the important find, Shubin was voted "Person of the Week" on ABC News in April 2006, and has appeared in The Colbert Report in 2008 and 2013. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2011.

Shubin is the author of numerous scientific articles, including more than twenty in the prestigious magazines Science and Nature. He has received numerous scholarships and awards, such as a Ph.D. from Harvard University, a Miller Research Fellowship, and a Guggenheim Fellowship.