George M. Whitesides is the world’s most cited living chemist and one of the most imaginative and prolific scientists and inventors of the past century. A pioneer in microfabrication and self-assembly at the nanoscale and the founder of several companies, he served on the faculty of MIT from 1963 to 1982 before moving his laboratory to Harvard, where he chaired the chemistry department 1986-89. He now holds one of 21 University Professorships at Harvard. Whitesides is a member of the National Academies of Science and Engineering, a major figure in science policy and a winner of the Kyoto Prize, King Faisal International Prize in Chemistry, U.S. National Medal of Science and many other honors. A lively explainer of scientific ideas, he is co-author with Felice Frankel of On the Surface of Things: Images of the Extraordinary in Science (2008) and No Small Matter: Science on the Nanoscale (2009). His extensive Harvard research group is currently investigating questions ranging from soft robotics to medical diagnosis to the origins of life; its goal is “to fundamentally change the paradigms of science.”