Malek-Yonan grew up in Richmond, Virginia and later moved to Oak Park, Illinois, and finally retired and settled in Carmel, California with his wife, Dr. Ingmar Malek-Yonan, a professor of German Studies at University of California at Berkeley and Stanford University who died in 2007.
His relative is a famous actress, author, director, public figure and activist Rosie Malek-Yonan.
Being from the Middle East, Malek-Yonan wondered why more Americans didn't use rice instead of allowing it to go to waste.
Malek-Yonan soon discovered that the natives of Assam in India grew a particular kind of rice called Patna.
Malek-Yonan had discovered the secret of canning rice but after meeting with a patent attorney, he realized he didn't have the funding necessary for a chemical analysis that was required to register his invention.
Malek-Yonan's process of steam pressure-cooking rice in its husks forced the vitamins out of the bran and into the kernel itself.
Additionally, the bran oil disintegrated, hardening the kernel surface thus making it virtually disease proof since the weevils could no longer penetrate it.
To meet the army's demand for more dry processed rice, Malek-Yonan convinced the General American Transportation Corporation of Chicago to design and build huge pressure steamers, rotary driers and coolers needed to process the rice.