He received his Ph.D. degree in Physics in 1981 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for his work on X-ray Scattering Study of the Critical Behavior of Binary Liquid Crystal Mixtures, under the supervision of Professor Robert J. Birgeneau. He joined the faculty of the University of California at Santa Barbara as a Professor of Materials and Physics in 1992.
Current research is focused in several areas.
100 Years Later, by J. Als-Nielsen and Gerhard Materlik, pg. 17, August 1989.