Linn F Mollenauer graduated from Cornell University in 1959 and obtained his PhD in physics from Stanford University in 1965. He taught physics at University of California, Berkeley, from 1965 until he joined the staff at Bell Laboratories in 1972.

He was a Fellow of OSA, and recipient of the Charles Hard Townes Medal in 1996 “for pioneering ultrafast optics in the 1.5 μm wavelength regime, demonstrating optical soliton propagation in fibers, and developing innovative soliton systems that have set records for high-capacity repeaterless data transmission,” and the R.W. Wood Prize in 1982 “in recognition of his invention, development and application of the F-center laser.”