Gregory Albert Benford was born January 30, 1941 in Mobile AL, along with his identical twin James. Their father was in the army, and they moved frequently. He graduated from the University of Oklahoma with a BS in physics in 1963, and earned his MS in 1965 and PhD in 1967 from UC San Diego. He worked at Lawrence Radiation Laboratory from 1967-71, then joined UC Irvine, where he was