Weiner received a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1973. From 1973 to 1974 he was a postdoctoral fellow in biochemistry at Stanford University with Dr. A. Kornberg, and from 1974 to 1976 he was a postdoctoral fellow at MIT with Dr. H.F. Lodish. In 1976 Weiner joined Yale University as assistant professor of biophysics and biochemistry; he became professor in 1984, with a joint appointment in genetics. In 2000 Weiner was named professor and chair of biochemistry at the UW School of Medicine. Among his many achievements, Weiner was a co-author of the Molecular Biology of the Gene (4th edition) by Watson et al., editor in chief of the journal Molecular and Cellular Biology from 1990 to 2000, and chair of the NIH Molecular Biology Study Section from 1997 to 1999. He is on the editorial boards of the journals Cell, RNA and Molecular Cell.