Professor of genetics and development in the Molecular and Cell Biology Department at University of California, Berkeley. Levine was the discoverer (with Bill McGinnis) of homeobox sequences in the homeotic genes Antennapedia and Ultrabithorax while a postdoctoral researcher with Walter Gehring at the University of Basel, Switzerland. His current research involves analysis of gene regulation and patterning in the early Drosophila embryo; studies of embryonic development in the tunicate, Ciona intestinalis, focused on the specification of the notochord and tail muscles; and a critical test of classical models for the evolutionary origins of the chordate body plan.