Bernard Yurke grew up in Boise, Idaho, USA. He did his first two years of undergraduate work at Boise State College, which is now Boise State University. He then transferred to the University of Texas at Austin where he received a BS and MA in physics. He did his PhD work at Cornell University in experimental low temperature physics. Upon completing his PhD he was hired as a research physicist at Bell Laboratories, where he worked for nearly 25 years. He retired from Bell Laboratories in 2007. He joined the faculty at Boise State University in January of 2008 and holds a joint appointment as Research Professor in the Materials Science and Engineering Department and in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department.

Yurke became a Distinguished Member of Technical Staff at Bell Laboratories and a Fellow of the Society, the American Physical Society, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He was the 2001 recipient of the Max Born Award for his work in quantum optics.