Scott F. Gilbert is the Howard A. Schneiderman Professor of Biology, emeritus, at Swarthmore College, where he teaches developmental genetics, embryology, and the history and critiques of biology. He is also a Finland Distinguished Professor, emeritus, at the University of Helsinki. He received his B.A. in both biology and religion, he earned a PhD in biology and M.A. in the history of science.
Scott currently has three textbooks in print, among which Developmental Biology (now in its twelfth edition) is probably the most widely used textbook in the field.
Scott has received several awards, both for his research and his outreach activity. He has been elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the St. Petersburg Society of Naturalists. In 2016, he presented a lecture on developmental biology to His Holiness, the Dalai Lama. In 2019, he might have been given his greatest honor: his former student, Tyler Lyson named a newly discovered species of fossil turtle “Saxochelys gilberti”.
He is funded by the National Science Foundation to work with undergraduates on that most interesting of topics -how the turtle forms its shell- and he continues to do research and write in both developmental biology and in the history and philosophy of biology.