[1][2] His father was a high school teacher who taught chemistry and biology and was also involved in the production of explosives like TNT.
[4] In 1950 he won second place in the Westinghouse Science Talent Search for high school seniors.
[5] He attended Vanderbilt University, graduating with a bachelor's degree in chemistry in 1953 and a PhD under the advisorship of Oscar Touster in 1958.
He then completed a postdoctoral appointment with Esmond Emerson Snell at the University of California, Berkeley where he researched the metabolism of vitamin B6 and pyridoxal kinases.
[4] He succeeded Robert E. Olson as the editor of the Annual Review of Nutrition in 1995, holding the position through 2004.