Vicki L. Chandler is a plant geneticist and member of the National Science Board. She is currently the Provost and Chief Academic Officer of Minerva University. Her research focuses on gene silencing and

paramutation In epigenetics, a paramutation is an interaction between two alleles at a single locus, whereby one allele induces a heritable change in the other allele. The change may be in the pattern of DNA methylation or histone modifications. The allele indu ...

Early life and education

Chandler married at age 17, and divorced at age 19 with two daughters. While working as a secretary, she began attending

Foothill College Foothill College is a public community college in Los Altos Hills, California. It is part of the Foothill–De Anza Community College District. It was founded on January 15, 1957, and offers 79 Associate degree programs, 1 Bachelor's degree pr ...

with the intention of studying

marine biology Marine biology is the scientific study of the biology of marine life, organisms in the sea. Given that in biology many phyla, families and genera have some species that live in the sea and others that live on land, marine biology classifies s ...

. Two years later, she transferred to the

University of California Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant univ ...

, where she received a B.A. in

biochemistry Biochemistry or biological chemistry is the study of chemical processes within and relating to living organisms. A sub-discipline of both chemistry and biology, biochemistry may be divided into three fields: structural biology, enzymology and ...

and studied under

Randy Schekman Randy Wayne Schekman (born December 30, 1948) is an American cell biologist at the University of California, Berkeley, former editor-in-chief of ''Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences'' and former editor of ''Annual Review of Cell and ...

. She completed a PhD in biochemistry at the University of California San Francisco in 1983 with

Keith Yamamoto Keith R. Yamamoto (born February 4, 1946) is vice chancellor of Science Policy and Strategy and professor of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology at the University of California, San Francisco, (UCSF). He is known for his Molecular Biology and Bio ...

. She then moved to

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

, where she did a postdoctoral fellowship in

genetics Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinian friar wor ...

in the lab of Virginia Walbot.

Career

Chandler was a member of the faculties of the

University of Oregon The University of Oregon (UO, U of O or Oregon) is a public research university in Eugene, Oregon. Founded in 1876, the institution is well known for its strong ties to the sports apparel and marketing firm Nike, Inc, and its co-founder, billion ...

and the

University of Arizona The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it was the first university in the Arizona Territory. T ...

. While at Oregon in 1988, she was named a Searle Scholar. In 1997, she moved to the University of Arizona, where she was a Regent’s professor in the Department of Plant Sciences and the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology and Associate Director of the Institute for Biomedical Science and Biotechnology. Before joining the

Keck Graduate Institute Keck Graduate Institute (KGI) is a private graduate school in Claremont, California. Founded by Henry Riggs in 1997, it is the seventh and newest member of the Claremont Colleges. History Henry Riggs, then president of Harvey Mudd College, ...

in 2015, she was the Chief Program Officer for Science for the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, beginning in 2009. She was the Chief Academic Officer and Dean of Faculty at Keck Graduate Institute. Chandler was elected as a member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

in 2002. She is also a fellow of the

American Association for the Advancement of Science The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific respons ...

. She has also been awarded the Presidential Young Investigator Award, NSF Faculty Award for Women Scientists and Engineers, and NIH Director’s Pioneer Award. She also served on the Life Sciences jury for the Infosys Prize in 2014. President Obama appointed Chandler to the National Science Board in 2014. She served on the board of the Searle Scholars Program from 2010 to 2015. Chandler was elected to the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...

in 2015. She has served as president of the

Genetics Society of America The Genetics Society of America (GSA) is a scholarly membership society of more than 5,500 genetics researchers and educators, established in 1931. The Society was formed from the reorganization of the Joint Genetics Sections of the American Soc ...

and of the American Society of Plant Biology.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chandler, Vicki American geneticists University of Oregon faculty University of Arizona faculty Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science University of California, San Francisco alumni UC Berkeley College of Chemistry alumni Year of birth missing (living people) Living people