Deland J. Myers Sr. is the retired Endowed Professor of Food Systems at Prairie View A&M University; a position he has held since August of 2015. He has a B.S. degree in Biology from the University of Missouri-Kansas City and both a Master's and Ph.D. in Food Technology from Iowa State University. After graduating with his Ph.D., he worked for the Pillsbury Company in Minneapolis for five years working on the development of a variety of consumer food products including pizza, microwave foods, and toaster products before returning to Iowa State University (ISU) as a faculty member. He served as a faculty member in the Food Science and Human Nutrition Department at ISU from January 1989 to August 2007. His research focused primarily on the utilization of corn and soy proteins in food and non food applications. He is considered one of the world’s authorities on the nonfood uses of proteins and has written a number of articles and book chapters on this subject and has two patents on the use of soy proteins as an adhesive. In August of 2007 he left ISU to take the position of Director of the School of Food Systems in the College of Agriculture, Food Systems and Natural Resources at North Dakota State University (NDSU). As Director of the School, he also served as the Director of the Great Plains Institute for Food Safety, Director of the Value Added Processing Center and Chair of the Cereal and Food Science Department. During his tenure at NDSU, he is credited with the development and growth of the Cereal and Food Science program by increasing the number of students, faculty and staff as well as research and outreach efforts regionally, nationally, and internationally. He also expanded his research into the utilization of pulses, dry beans and other oilseed proteins (canola, flax, and sunflower) and in the education, research and outreach of food safety and food security in the Upper Great Plains Region as well as nationally and internationally. He also served as the NCAA Faculty Athletic Representative and in this capacity, served on the NCAA Academic Cabinet representing the Summit League. In his professional career he has also been very active in the academic and professional development of underrepresented undergraduate and graduate students. He has also been active in a number of professional associations including the American Oil Chemists Society where he served as the President of the Society in 2012-13 and was named as a Research Fellow in the AOCS in 2015. While at North Dakota State, Dr. Myers started a focused effort in the area of Food Security and began investigating ways to develop academic programs to train future professionals in this field; particularly to learn how to develop affordable and nutritious food products to meet the needs of low resource communities. As the Endowed Professor of Food Systems at Prairie View A&M University, he is continuing his work to develop research and academic programs focused on Food Security. In May of 2018 he was awarded a 5.3 million dollar grant from the Texas A&M Chancellors Research Initiative to found the Integrated Food Security Research Center on the campus of Prairie View A&M University for the purpose of establishing a center with a focused research, academic, and outreach effort to understand the causes and impacts of food insecurity on communities and to find ways to alleviate food insecurity in these communities. In 2019, The Institute of Food Safety and Nutrition/National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), USDA, selected Dr. Myers to serve a 2-year term as Panel Manager for the AFRI- A1364 Improving Food Quality Program Peer Panel. The USDA wrote that he was selected based on his stature in the field, record of outstanding research, education or extension contributions, and reputation for fairness and objectivity. He and his wife Evie have three children; Corey, Latisha, and Deland II and 7 grandchildren.
