Chris Easton is a graduate of Flinders University and the University of Adelaide. He held positions at Harvard University (1980-1981), the Research School of Chemistry (1982), the University of Canterbury (1983-1986) and the University of Adelaide (1986-1994), before his appointment as a Senior Fellow in the Research School of Chemistry, in 1995.

He was awarded a D.Sc. from the University of Adelaide in 1998 and is the recipient of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute Birch Medal for 2000, and the Archibald Ollé Prize for Chemical Literature for 2000. He was promoted to Professor at the Research School of Chemistry in 2001 and elected as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science in 2004.