Craig Huneke earned his BA degree at Oberlin College and his PhD degree in mathematics from Yale University in 1978. He was a Junior Fellow in the Michigan Society of Fellows, and a Sloan Fellow. He gave an invited talk at the ICM in Kyoto, 1990. He has taught at both Purdue University and the University of Kansas, and is currently the Marvin Rosenblum Professor of Mathematics at the University of Virginia where he will become Chair of the Department beginning 2013–14. He has published over 150 papers; his main research interest is commutative algebra. Twenty-one students have completed their doctoral degrees under his direction.

He co-chaired workshops at MSRI in 1987 and one this coming spring, 2013, and chaired the organizing committee of a year-long program at MSRI in 2002–03. Other past service include being on the Council and the Executive Committee of the American Mathematical Society. He is currently an editor of the Journal of Algebra and Number Theory, Collectanea Math., and Mathematical Research Letters.