Prof.  Mechler completed a BSc/MSc degree in Chemistry and Physics in 1996, and obtained his PhD in Physics/Materials science in 2001 at University of Szeged (formerly Attila Jozsef university), Hungary. In the same year he received a NATO Science for Peace Advanced Postdoctoral Fellowship to work at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he spent three years working on a range of projects united by the need of cutting edge nanoscale design and characterization, such as nanoviscosimetry, bioinspired materials and biomolecule interactions. He moved to Australia in 2004 as the recipient of a five year Monash Fellowship awarded by Monash University where he established his independent research program on biomolecule self-assembly, focusing on membrane biophysics and peptide-membrane interactions, while maintaining an interest in bioinspired materials and bioactive natural products. He has joined La Trobe University staff in 2009 and has been working there since.

Prof. Mechler is Fellow of the Royal Society for Chemistry (UK) and Honorary Fellow of the Hungarian Academy of Engineering.