A research institute is an establishment endowed for doing research. Research institutes may specialize in basic research or may be oriented to applied research. Although the term often implies scientific research, there are also many research institutes in the social sciences as well, especially for sociological and historical research purposes such as the Institute of Historical Research. Some research institutes are associated with public education museums such as the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute.

In the early medieval period, several astronomical observatories were built in the Islamic world. The first of these was the 9th-century Baghdad observatory built during the time of the Abbasid caliph al-Ma'mun, though the most famous were the 13th-century Maragheh observatory, 15th-century Ulugh Beg Observatory.

The earliest research institute in Europe was Tycho Brahe's Uraniborg complex on the island of Hven, a 16th-century astronomical laboratory set up to make highly-accurate measurements of the stars. In the United States there are numerous notable research institutes including Bell Labs, The Scripps Research Institute and SRI International. Hughes Aircraft used a research institute structure for its organizational model which makes sense given its heavy emphasis on creativity and innovation.

Sir Richard Timothy "Tim" Hunt, FRS (born 19 February 1943 in Neston, Cheshire) is an English biochemist.

Hunt was awarded the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Paul Nurse and Leland H. Hartwell for their discoveries of protein molecules that control the division (duplication) of cells.

When cells with nuclei divide, they divide in phases called G1 (growth), S (synthesis), G2 (growth), and M (mitosis). Nurse, Hartwell and Hunt together discovered two proteins, cyclin and CDK (cyclin dependent kinase), that control the transition from one stage to another. These proteins are called checkpoints, because they check whether the cell has divided properly. If the cell doesn't divide correctly, other proteins will attempt to repair it, and if unsuccessful, they will destroy the cell. If a cell divides incorrectly and survives, it can cause cancer and other serious diseases.

Working in sea urchin eggs, Hunt discovered cyclins, proteins that bind to cyclin dependent kinase (CDK) proteins and regulate their activity. Cyclins and CDKs turn other cell cycle proteins on and off by adding or removing phosphate groups.

Peter Agre (pronounced "ahg-ray") (born January 30, 1949) is an American medical doctor, professor, and molecular biologist who was awarded the 2003 Nobel Prize in Chemistry (which he shared with Roderick MacKinnon) for his discovery of aquaporins. Aquaporins are water-channel proteins that move water molecules through the cell membrane. In February 2009, Peter Agre was inducted as the 163rd president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the nation's largest scientific organization. He is currently a professor at Johns Hopkins University.

Agre was born in Northfield, Minnesota, to a Norwegian American father and a mother of Swedish and Norwegian descent. He received his B.A. from Augsburg College in Minneapolis and his M.D. in 1974 from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland. From 1975 to 1978 he completed his clinical training in Internal Medicine at Case Western Reserve University's Case Medical Center under Charles C.J. Carpenter. He served as the Vice Chancellor for science and technology at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, North Carolina, where he guided the development of Duke's biomedical research. Agre leads the Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute (JHMRI). Agre became director at JHMRI and joined the faculty of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health on January 1, 2008. He was elected to membership in the National Academy of Sciences in 2000 and to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2003. He is also a founding member of Scientists and Engineers for America (SEA).

Johns Hopkins (May 19, 1795 – December 24, 1873) was an American entrepreneur, abolitionist and philanthropist of 19th-century Baltimore, Maryland.

His bequests founded numerous institutions bearing his name, including Johns Hopkins Hospital, Johns Hopkins University, Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

A biography entitled Johns Hopkins: A Silhouette written by his cousin, Helen Hopkins Thom, was published in 1929 by the Johns Hopkins University Press.

Johns Hopkins was born on May 19, 1795, to Samuel Hopkins (1759–1814) of Anne Arundel County, Maryland, and Hannah Janney (1774–1864), of Loudoun County, Virginia. Home was Whitehall, a 500-acre (two km²) tobacco plantation in Anne Arundel County. His first name derives from a maternal great-grandmother, Margaret Johns, who passed it on to her son.

The Hopkins family were members of the Society of Friends (Quakers). In 1807 they emancipated their slaves in accordance with their local Society decree, which called for freeing the able-bodied and caring for the others, who would remain at the plantation and provide labor as they could. The second eldest of eleven children, 12 year-old Johns was required to work on the farm, interrupting his formal education. From 1806 to 1809, he likely attended The Free School of Anne Arundel County, which was located in today's Davidsonville, Maryland.