Eustace L. Dereniak was born December 29, 1941, in Standish, Michigan, USA. Dereniak received a BS in electrical engineering at Michigan Technological University, MS in Electrical Engineering from University of Michigan, and a PhD in optics from the University of Arizona. He currently is Professor Emeritus of Optical Sciences and Electrical and Computer Engineering at the U of A.

After his undergraduate degree, Dereniak joined Raytheon Company as a radar engineer and was responsible for an antenna design and RF signal detection tasks. He then worked for North American Aviation during the Apollo program, developing infrared optical components and detectors. He returned to school in 1970, ultimately receiving his PhD in 1976.

He has co-authored a number of textbooks, written chapters in many publications, and has published over 100 journal articles.

He is a Fellow of OSA and SPIE, and he received the Esther Hoffman Beller Medal.