Distinguished MSU CVM Toxicologist Earns one of the Field's Highest Honors
Mississippi State University’s Dr. Janice E. Chambers, a long-serving faculty member, has been named the 2026 recipient of the Society of Toxicology Founders Award—one of the profession’s highest honors.
“I am delighted,” Chambers said. “It is wonderful to be recognized like this by my colleagues in the toxicology field.”
A William L. Giles Distinguished Professor since 1995 and director of MSU’s Center for Environmental Health Sciences since 1991, Chambers serves in the College of Veterinary Medicine’s Department of Comparative Biomedical Sciences.
“We are thrilled to congratulate Dr. Chambers on this well-deserved honor,” said Dr. Michail Panagiotidis, director of DCBS. “Her career and dedication are a testament to the world-class, world-changing science conducted every day in the College of Veterinary Medicine.”
A California native, Chambers earned her bachelor’s degree in biology from the University of San Francisco in 1969 and her doctorate in animal physiology from Mississippi State University in 1973. She and her late husband, Dr. Howard Chambers—also a toxicologist—moved to Starkville in the early 1970s, where she completed her doctoral studies and began her long MSU career.
Following years of service in the biology department, Chambers was recruited in 1990 by Dr. Dwight Mercer, then dean, to help establish a toxicology program in the college. She would quickly become the founding director of the Center for Environmental Health Sciences.
“At the time, there wasn’t a toxicology program [at the CVM], but Dr. Mercer’s background was in toxicology, and he understood how important a field it is,” said Chambers.
Chambers has authored more than 130 peer-reviewed publications and secured over $30 million in competitive research funding, primarily from the National Institutes of Health and the U.S. Department of Defense. Her work focuses on organophosphate toxicology, including pesticides and chemical threat agents, and has contributed to the development of promising new antidotes. This work has resulted in U.S. and European patents. Her research findings have contributed to regulatory decisions on pesticide usage.
“The chemistry for the pesticides we study is fundamentally the same as that for nerve agents; it’s just a matter of scale,” Chambers said. “The hope, of course, is that we would never need such antidotes, but in the event of a chemical attack or industrial accident, better treatments would save lives and save brain function.”
Chambers emphasized that her laboratory does not handle live nerve agents, instead using safe surrogate compounds.
She also attributes much of her career’s success to collaborations with her late husband.
“Howard and I had a wonderful personal and professional relationship,” she said. “We had joint projects and grants for many years and were working together right up until the end. Some of our projects I’m continuing to work on.”
Dr. Howard Chambers passed away in 2016.
According to the Society of Toxicology, the Founders Award honors members who demonstrate exceptional leadership in advancing toxicological science and strengthening the role of toxicology in safety decision-making.
Chambers will be formally recognized March 22, during the SOT Annual Meeting in San Diego.