Biography: Irwin Shapiro was born in New York City in 1929. After graduating from Brooklyn Technical High School, Shapiro did an undergraduate degree in mathematics at Cornell University, and a master's and PhD in physics at Harvard University. Shapiro joined MIT Lincoln Laboratory in 1954 and became a professor of physics at MIT in 1967. In 1982, Shapiro became a professor at Harvard University and also director of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Shapiro was director of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics from 1982 to 2004].

Irwin won the Bowie in 1993, which is the highest award of the AGU . In 1997, he became the First Timken University Professor. Irwin Shapiro has had a very localized geographical career - all in Cambridge - but has wandered widely in research, from study of the core of the Earth, through remote-sensing exploration of the solar system, to observation of the most distant known objects in the universe. He also originated and carried out solar-system tests of the general theory of relativity. The common thread tying these various topics together is his use of radio or radar techniques in all of these efforts.