In a special issue of a journal dedicated to his work, the editor said "Jay was one of biochemical engineering's most creative thinkers and spirited advocates, a true innovator who played an enormous role in establishing biochemical engineering as the dynamic discipline it is today".

[4] He studied chemical engineering at Rice University receiving a BA in 1966 and PhD in 1969 working with Fritz Horn.

He worked for Shell then taught chemical engineering at the University of Houston starting in 1971 before moving to Caltech in 1980 before becoming Professor of Biotechnology at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich in 1992.

[1][4] He was married to fellow chemical engineer Frances Arnold and had a son, James Howard Bailey (born in 1990) with her.

He has another son, Sean Bailey, an American film and television producer who has been the president of Walt Disney Studios Motion Picture Production since his appointment in 2010 until 2024.