Born in Damanhur (Egypt) on February 26, 1946, this American chemist and university professor of Egyptian descent was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1999.

He earned a bachelor´s degree in Chemistry from the University of Alexandria, and he then moved to the United States to complete a doctorate in the same field at the University of Pennsylvania in 1974. After working for two years at the University of California, Berkeley, he transferred to the California Technology Institute, where he has held the Linus Pauling Professor of Chemical Physics since 1990.

Zewail´s interest in understanding the dynamics of chemical reactions in real time, in knowing exactly what happens and at what speed between reagents and products, led him to project short duration laser pulses on the particles that intervene in reactions.

In May of 2008, he was named honorary doctorate by the Universidad Complutense de Madrid.

Source: Wikipedia and Nobelprize