Melvin Ellis Calvin (April 8, 1911 - January 8, 1997) was an American chemist most famed for discovering the Calvin cycle along with Andrew Benson and James Bassham, for which he was awarded the 1961 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

Melvin Calvin earned his Bachelor of Science from the Michigan College of Mining and Technology in 1931 and his Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Minnesota in 1935.
During the 1950's he was among the first members of the Society for General Systems Research.
In 1963 he was given the additional title of Professor of Molecular Biology. He was founder and Director of the Laboratory of Chemical Biodynamics and simultaneously Associate Director of Berkeley Radiation Laboratory, where he conducted much of his research until his retirement in 1980.
He also spent many years testing the chemical evolution of life and wrote a book on the subject that was published in 1969.