Prof. Bish received his B.S. in geology from Furman University and a Ph.D. in mineralogy from The Pennsylvania State University. After a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University, he joined the technical staff at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. In 2003 he moved to the Department of Geological Sciences at Indiana University as the Haydn Murray Chair in Clay Mineralogy. He is currently Professor Emeritus with the Department of Chemistry. Prof. Bish has actively participated in a number of mineralogical, clay minerals, zeolite, and crystallographic societies. He has received a number of awards including the Jackson, Brindley, and Bailey Awards of The Clay Minerals Society, the AIPEA Medal of the International Association for the Study of Clays, and the Mumpton Award of the International Natural Zeolite Association. He was also one of the three original designers of the CheMin X-ray diffraction instrument currently operating on Mars.