I received a Ph.D. in theoretical chemistry from St. Louis University in 1973, and I have approximately twenty scientific publications.

In 2006, I began writing history of science and received an appointment at the University of California, Berkeley. I have since published two books: Cathedrals of Science: The Personalities and Rivalries That Made Modern Chemistry (Oxford University Press, 2008) and American Arsenal: A Century of Waging War (Oxford University Press, 2014).

Cathedrals of Science won the 2008 PROSE prize as the best book on chemistry or physics from an American academic press.