Nancy Cox
Agricultural Experiment Station Director andAssociate Dean for Research
S-129 Agricultural Science Building North
Lexington, KY 40546-0091
Phone: (859) 257-3333
Fax: (859) 257-3393
ncox@uky.edu
Nancy Cox is the Director of the Kentucky Agricultural Experiment Station and Associate Dean for Research in the College of Agriculture at the University of Kentucky (UK). She holds a B.A. (1975) in English from Furman University and advanced degrees in animal physiology from the University of Georgia (M.S., 1977) and North Carolina State University (Ph.D., 1982). From 1982 through 1996 she was a researcher in the Department of Animal and Dairy Sciences at Mississippi State University. From 1997 to 2001 she was Assistant and Associate Director of the Mississippi Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station.
Dr. Cox’s research area is reproductive physiology of farm animals and she has been involved in consulting with producers and animal health companies. She developed strategies to improve reproductive performance in swine and did research on environmental estrogens. In 1998-1999 she co-chaired, with Senator Robert Dearing, the Task Force on the Environment for the Mississippi Legislature; this task force conducted a year-long study on the scientific issues related to environmental regulations on large swine farms. At Mississippi State University she led efforts to establish two university-wide centers, the Remote Sensing Technologies Center and the Life Sciences and Biotechnology Institute.
She joined UK in 2001, and her duties include oversight of Experiment Station state and federal budgets. She is responsible for the college grants office that managed over $31 million in external awards in fiscal year 2007. She represents the College of Agriculture in developing and implementing a partnership with a newly established federal laboratory, USDA Agricultural Research Service Forage-Animal Production Research Unit.
The Experiment Station manages research and education facilities at the Kentucky Research and Education Center in Princeton, the Robinson Station in Quicksand, and the Eden Shale Unit in Owenton, Kentucky.
Dr. Cox represents the College on most Kentucky agricultural commodity boards and is on the executive board of the Kentucky Clean Fuels Coalition. She is responsible for current planning efforts for an Equine Institute and a Food Systems Innovation Center at UK, and she is serving as interim executive director of the Gluck Equine Research Foundation.
Dr. Cox recently finished terms as chair of the Science and Technology Committee for the Experiment Station Committee on Policy (National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges; NASULGC) and Director of the American Society of Animal Science. In 2005 she became a member of the Board of Policy Directors for the Board on Agriculture Assembly NASULGC. In 2007 she was named to the National Advisory Board for Research, Extension and Economics; this board advises the Secretary of the US Department of Agriculture on research priorities.