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Phillips grew up in Adelaide, Australia and studied for his Bachelors’ and Doctoral Degrees at the Flinders University of South Australia. After stints as a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Maryland and the University of Washington he took a position as an assistant professor at 51���� in 2000.

He became an associate professor in 2004 and a full professor in 2009. He served as director of the Institute of Nuclear and Particle Physics from 2014-2020.

Phillips develops theories of the atomic nucleus and has a particular interest in uncertainty quantification—the science of assessing the reliability of scientific predictions. He is the Principal Investigator of a $3.7M grant from the National Science Foundation, obtained together with researchers from Michigan State, Northwestern, and Ohio State called “Bayesian Analysis of Nuclear Dynamics” which seeks to improve forecasts of nuclear-physics quantities.

He is also interested in the way nuclei that are only just stable behave, and is strongly involved with the $700M Facility for Rare Isotope Beams at Michigan State University. His work is internationally recognized and he has held Visiting Professorships in Japan and Germany. He has been named as both a Fellow and an Outstanding Referee by the American Physical Society.