He subsequently attended Rice University in the United States, completing his master's degree in 1966, followed by a doctorate from the California Institute of Technology, graduating in 1971.
[1] In 2018, he and his collaborators completed the Quake Project, which helped predict how earthquakes impact urban infrastructure.
[1] His early work was the basis for the soil-structure seismic provisions within the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program (NEHRP).
[2] Bielak was awarded the Gordon Bell Prize in 2003 for computational research on the effects of future earthquakes in Los Angeles.
[3] He was elected to membership of the United States National Academy of Engineering in 2010 "for advancing knowledge and methods in earthquake engineering and in regional-scale seismic motion simulation.