Jim Ibers was born in Los Angeles, CA, USA, in 1930. His early ambition was to become an archaeologist, then an astronomer, and then a chemist, so he applied to Caltech, his neighbourhood school for science and engineering, graduating in 1951. During his undergraduate years, he did research with Verner Schomaker and took a course in X-ray crystallography. He became hooked.

Within the first month of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, thousands of scholars fled the country. The global scientific community reacted quickly and created numerous opportunities in their institutions and labs.