Yitzhak Apeloig was born in Buchara, Uzbekistan in 1944 and immigrated to Israel in 1947. He received his B.A., M.Sc. and Ph.D. (1974) in Chemistry (summa cum laude) from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In 1976, he joined the Technion, became a full professor in 1988 and has held a Chair in Chemistry since 1993. Between 1995 and 1999, he served as the Dean of the Faculty of Chemistry.

He served as the President of the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology between 2001 and 2009, In his eight years as President, he led the Technion into new areas of science and technology, and raised some $500 million dollars in donations. Among others, he established the $100 million Russell Berrie Institute for Nanotechnology, the $50 million Lorry I. Lokey Center in Life Sciences and Engineering, the $25 million Center for Autonomous Systems and the $100 million Alfred E. Mann Institute for Biomedical Development devoted to accelerating the commercialization of advanced biomedical technologies invented by Technion's researchers.

Yitzhak Apeloig is a world leader in organosilicon chemistry and the application of the quantum mechanics theory to chemistry. He has published more than 180 scholarly papers and reviews, and edited seven books. He received many awards for his scientific innovative work, including the American Chemical Society Frederic Stanley Kipping Award in Silicon Chemistry (2010), The Wacker Silicone Award (2007), an Honorary Doctorate from the Technical University of Berlin (2006), the Israel Chemical Society Prize (2002), the Alexander von Humboldt Senior Scientist Award (twice), the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Visiting Professor Award (3 times) and the Technion Awards for Academic Excellence, Excellence in Research and Excellence in Teaching. Prof. Apeloig is an Honorary Foreign Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2010) and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2009). He has been a visiting professor at universities on four continents and presented more than 150 invited and plenary lectures at international conferences, universities and enterprises around the world.

Eminent Scientists at the RBI is a lecture series that provides the opportunity for scientists from the Ruđer Bošković Institute and broader Croatian scientific community to meet some of the world’s leading scientists.