After school, he planned to continued his education, but he didn’t have money so he decided to to earn financial support by enlisting in the United States Army. He has some problems with his impaired eyesight so in the end Edward failed the Army medical examination.

In the 40s he finally enrolled in the University of Alabama. He reached a B.S. Degree in biology and in the 1950 graduated from the College with M.S. Degree. Two years after he enrolled in The Harvard University. Being a fellow of the Harvard Society, he traveled a lot with overseas expeditions. He was in Cuba and Mexico, travel the South Pacific, including Australia, New Guinea, Fiji islands, New Caledonia as well as Sri Lanka. He finally got his Ph.D. Degree in the 1955.

Afterwards, He decided to stay in Harvard and worked there in one of the faculty about forty years from 1956. At first, he started his scientific career as an ant taxonomist. He worked a lot on an ant evolution. He also was an author of the theory, which was titled "taxon cycle”. During his years at Harvard, he collaborated with other scientists, one of them was mathematician Robert MacArthur. In the middle of the 60s, they both went to the island in the Florida Keys, where they tested the theory of species equilibrium.

He reached a success thanks to his works and publications like “The Insect Societies” and “Sociobiology: The New Synthesis”, which were published in the 1971and 1975. On the 1978 the world saw his other book “On Human Nature”, which was about human evolution. With this major work he was honored by Pulitzer Prize. Later he reached his second Pulitzer along with scientist Bert Hölldobler and their work “The Ants”, which was published in the 1990.

Four years later he published his autobiography with unique title “Naturalist”. In the 1996 he was officially retired from Harvard University. For more than 60 years of scientific work he reached a lot of awards and is known as “father” of sociobiology as well as biodiversity. In the 1999 he was honored by the American Humanist Association with Humanist of the Year title. He reached the Nierenberg Prize in the 2001.

In the 2006 he was awarded with a Linnean Tercentenary Silver Medal. He also is a novelist and in the 2010 he got a Heartland Prize for his first novel, which was titled “Anthill: A Novel”.

He is married to Irene Wilson (nee Kelley). He met his wife in the early 50s and tied their married knot in the 1955. The couple was blessed with one child, named Catherine Wilson. The information about him can be found on several social media sites, like Twitter or Instagram. There is no any information about his total net worth.