Deng Jiaxian was born in Huaining County, Anhui Province in 1924. He is a member of the Communist Party of China and a nuclear physicist. He was a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences during his lifetime. He graduated from the Physics Department of Southwest United University in 1945 and then taught in Beijing.

He went to the Purdue University Physics Department in 1948 to study abroad. In 1950, he received a Ph.D. in Physics. In October 1950, Deng Jiaxian gave up the superior working environment in the United States and resolutely returned to China to devote himself to China's national defense science and technology