Chandrapal obtained a B.Sc. degree from M.G.M.College, Udupi, in 1968, an M.Sc. from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, India, and a Ph.D. from Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island (1976). After a post-doctoral fellowship at Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research, Stuttgart, Germany, she came to the University of Missouri, Columbia, in 1978, where she is currently a professor in the department of physics and astronomy.