From 1951 to 1954 he attended Alfred University in the southern tier of New York state where he studied ceramic engineering and received a Bachelor of Science in glass technology.
Moore worked at Brookhaven National Laboratory with Oliver Schaeffer and Nobel Laureate Raymond Davis in the summer of 1955 on a project using cosmic ray exposure to determine rock ages before beginning his graduate studies at the California Institute of Technology that fall.
Moore earned his PhD in Chemistry in 1960 on The kinetics of the reactions of silver, lead, and thallium with thioacetamide, and The distribution of barium, titanium, manganese, chromium, iron, nickel and cobalt in stony meteorites.
During this time, Moore was approached by George A. Boyd, acting on behalf of Arizona State University, to become the founding Director of ASU's Center for Meteorite Studies[8] in the Department of Chemistry.
Moore's work provided the foundation for the continued development of the Center for Meteorite Studies as well as the growth of astrophysics and planetary geology at ASU.