Born in Tel Aviv, Jacob Klein received his secondary education in England. After
completing his national service in Israel in 1970, Klein gained his B.A.
degree in physics from the University of Cambridge, where in 1977 he also
received his M.A. and Ph.D. degrees at the Cavendish Laboratory. He did his
postdoc at the Weizmann Institute, and from 1980 to 1984 was a senior
scientist at the Weizmann Institute and University Demonstrator at the
Cavendish Laboratory. In 1984, he was appointed professor at the Weizmann
Institute, named a full professor in 1987, then subsequently headed its
polymer research department and was named chairman of its scientific council.
From 2000 to 2007, Klein was concomitantly the Dr. Lee's Professor of
Chemistry at the University of Oxford and head of its physical and
theoretical chemistry department. His interests in soft matter have ranged
from the dynamics and interfacial properties of polymers to the behavior of
confined fluids, biological lubrication and tissue engineering, published in
over 250 papers. His honors include the High Polymer Physics Prize of the
American Physical Society (1995), the 2010 Prize of the Israel Chemical
Society, the 2011 Soft Matter and Biophysical Chemistry Award and Medal of
the UK Royal Society of Chemistry and the 2012 Tribology Gold Medal. In 2013,
he was elected to the European Academy. Of some 70 students and postdocs he
mentored, 26 are currently academic faculty in Israel, Europe, North America
and China.