jain received his bachelor's degree in 1972 from iit kanpur, and his ms and phd degrees in 1974 and 1976 from the university of delaware, all in chemical engineering. he served as assistant professor of chemical engineering at columbia university (1976 to 1978), and as assistant (1978–79), associate (1979–83) and full professor (1983-1991) of chemical engineering at carnegie mellon university. he spent his 1983-84 sabbatical year as a guggenheim fellow in the departments of chemical engineering at mit, bioengineering at ucsd and radiation oncology at stanford, and his 1990-91 sabbatical as a humboldt senior scientist-awardee at the institute of pathophysiology of university of mainz, and the institute of experimental surgery of university of munich. in 1991, jain became the andrew werk cook professor of radiation oncology (tumor biology) at harvard medical school, and director of edwin l. steele laboratories of tumor biology at massachusetts general hospital.