From 2007 till the end, Rao was a Raja Ramanna Fellow at the International Advanced Research Centre for Powder Metallurgy and New Materials, in Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh.

Rao was born on 21 March 1942 to S. R. Narayanaswamy Naidu and Laxmi Bai at Kavutavaram in the Krishna District of Andhra Pradesh.

His father Narayanaswamy Naidu, was a government servant and retired as Deputy Registrar of Co-operative Societies while his mother, Laxmi Bai was also educated and studied up to matriculation when very few women were going to school.

Thereafter, he went on to study intermediate at the newly established Andhra Loyola College at Vijayawada and moved over to Osmania University, Hyderabad for higher education.

At the young age of 19 years, in 1961, Rao graduated with a master's degree in physics from the Osmania University in Hyderabad India.

Anantharaman encouraged him to enroll in the doctoral program at the Department of Metallurgical Engineering at B.H.U (now Indian Institute of Technology (BHU) Varanasi).

Rao's pioneering doctoral dissertation in Rapid Solidification laid the foundation for the research in this area in India.

Many noteworthy contributions made by Rao, his students and erstwhile colleagues at the Banaras Hindu University have brought immense recognition to India as an important centre for rapid solidification studies.

In the past decade, Rao's interests shifted to the synthesis of materials by following routes which are very similar to those practised by living organisms.

Since retirement Rao had been pursuing theoretical studies involving the specific heats of about eleven metals which undergo the hexagonal to body centred cubic phase transformation.

He received the Distinguished Alumnus Award of Indian Institute of Science as well as that of the Department of Metallurgy, Banaras Hindu University.