He enrolled in an oversea program in 1939 and entered the University of Toronto in Canada in 1940 and obtained a master's degree there.

After obtaining a Doctor of Philosophy degree in aeronautics, he stayed there as a research fellow.

Invited by Tsien Hsue-Shen, Guo returned to China in October 1956 and became the vice director of the Institute of Mechanics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

In 1958, he helped found the University of Science and Technology of China and served as the chair of the department of Chemical Physics.

Beginning in May 1960, Guo served as vice director of the Beijing Ninth Research Institute of the Second Ministry of Industry, and became a leader of China's atomic and hydrogen bomb projects.