Lawrence B. Slobodkin
Encyclopedia
Lawrence B. Slobodkin (The Bronx
, June 22, 1928 — Old Field, New York
Sept. 12, 2009 ) was an American ecologist
and Professor Emeritus
at the Department of Ecology and Evolution, Stony Brook University, State University of New York. He was one of the leading pioneers of modern ecology
. His innovative thinking and research, provocative teaching, and visionary leadership helped transform ecology into a modern science, with deep links to evolution.
and Florence (Gersh) Slobodkin. He was strongly influenced by the artistic, intellectual, cultural, and political milieu in which he developed; his mother was a writer and his father a noted sculptor who later became a well-known illustrator and writer of children's books, including biographies of the legendary revolutionaries Garibaldi
and Lenin
. While absorbing the lessons of art and literature, Slobodkin developed a guiding interest in biology, which he pursued first at Bethany College
in West Virginia, and later under G. Evelyn Hutchinson
at Yale University
, where he received his doctorate in 1951 at the age of 23 .
After completing his Ph.D.
, Slobodkin worked for two years for the United States Fish and Wildlife Service
, where he developed a novel, theoretically informed hypothesis for the origin of red tides. He then joined the faculty of the University of Michigan
in the Department of Zoology in 1953. In 1968 he moved to the State University of New York at Stony Brook.
Among his many other activities, Slobodkin held a key post as instructor and director of a marine ecology course, taught at the Marine Biological Laboratory
at Woods Hole
for many years in the 1960s, that served as a training ground for prominent ecologists. He was a visiting scholar at Hebrew University, Tel Aviv University
, and Ben-Gurion University, as well as the Weizman Institute, in Israel, twice a Guggenheim Fellow, twice a Fulbright Fellow, and a fellow of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
. He was honored by being elected as Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
and as Foreign Member of the Linnean Society of London
. He was president of the American Society of Naturalists
in 1985 and the Society for General Systems Research
in 1969 .
In 2005, Slobodkin, then Emeritus
Professor of Ecology and Evolution at Stony Brook University, was named Eminent Ecologist
by the Ecological Society of America
.
and Gause had already laid. Slobodkin played an important role in developing this framework via his research, teaching, and his very influential book, Growth and Regulation of Animal Populations, which served as a blueprint for generations of students of ecology at all levels. His doctoral research, a detailed study of the role of age structure in the growth of experimental populations of the microcrustacean Daphnia, epitomized his approach—a quantitative experimental test of a mathematical theory that was intended to apply broadly .
Slobodkin pioneered the use of calorimetry
as a tool for studying the "efficiency" of energy flow in ecosystem
s, a field in which his groundbreaking experimental work left a permanent legacy. He initiated a research program on brown and green hydra that explored such problems as the joint role of food and predation
on limiting population growth
, and the continuum of species interactions that lie between mutualism and parasitism
.
Together with Nelson Hairston
, Sr. and Frederick Smith, he wrote one of the most influential papers in the history of ecology, a four-page essay in The American Naturalist that is still required reading for many students in this field. Submitted under the title "Étude" (unacceptable to the editors), HSS (as the paper is often referred to, for Hairston, Smith, and Slobodkin) offered a simple but closely reasoned hypothesis for the regulation of populations at each trophic level
in terrestrial ecosystem
s.
The "world is green", they reasoned, despite the insatiable appetite and enormous diversity of herbivores, because herbivore populations are held in check by their own natural enemies—predators, parasitoid
s, parasites, and pathogen
s. This hypothesis was both controversial and inspiring, and stimulated much later research on tri-trophic interactions, food web
dynamics
, and trophic cascade
s .
Larry Slobodkin's quick and sophisticated wit, infusing both his conversation and teaching, was legendary. During a lecture at the University of Michigan, held in a basement-level auditorium where the podium was flanked by a door to the building's loading dock, he described the musical genius that blessed successive generations of the Bach family to illustrate principles of heredity
. At that moment, a great clattering of garbage cans issued from the loading area. The noise had hardly stopped when Slobodkin quipped, “the janitors here prefer Tchaikovsky” .
While at Stony Brook, Slobodkin served as department chair for five years and directed its graduate program for seven years, in addition to serving as co-editor of The American Naturalist, and writing two more books, most recently A Citizen's Guide to Ecology. Many of the Ph.D. students he mentored first at the University of Michigan and later at Stony Brook went on to become well known ecologists
, environmental scientists
, and evolutionary biologists .
When asked to write a piece for the Ecological Society of America
's series, What Do Ecologists Do?, after receiving the award, Slobodkin wrote, "My own advice on career development is that there are three career paths open and it is wise to excel at one of them: the first is to become an expert on some group of organisms that excites you…. Second, you [could] become very good at the most popular current techniques at the highest technical level you can imagine. In contrast, you can take the third, and most dangerous, path. You can strenuously avoid doing what everyone else is doing and search for new ideas and new tests for old ideas." Larry Slobodkin followed, with intensity, that third and most perilous path .
Articles
The Bronx
The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...
, June 22, 1928 — Old Field, New York
Old Field, New York
Old Field is a village of 918 residents in Suffolk County, New York, United States. The Incorporated Village of Old Field is in the town of Brookhaven, on the North Shore of Long Island. It is one of the most affluent communities in the state and is among the wealthiest towns in the United States...
Sept. 12, 2009 ) was an American ecologist
Ecology
Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems...
and Professor Emeritus
Emeritus
Emeritus is a post-positive adjective that is used to designate a retired professor, bishop, or other professional or as a title. The female equivalent emerita is also sometimes used.-History:...
at the Department of Ecology and Evolution, Stony Brook University, State University of New York. He was one of the leading pioneers of modern ecology
Ecology
Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems...
. His innovative thinking and research, provocative teaching, and visionary leadership helped transform ecology into a modern science, with deep links to evolution.
Biography
Slobodkin was born in 1928 in the Bronx, son of Louis SlobodkinLouis Slobodkin
Louis Slobodkin , born in Albany, New York was a sculptor, author and illustrator of numerous children's books....
and Florence (Gersh) Slobodkin. He was strongly influenced by the artistic, intellectual, cultural, and political milieu in which he developed; his mother was a writer and his father a noted sculptor who later became a well-known illustrator and writer of children's books, including biographies of the legendary revolutionaries Garibaldi
Giuseppe Garibaldi
Giuseppe Garibaldi was an Italian military and political figure. In his twenties, he joined the Carbonari Italian patriot revolutionaries, and fled Italy after a failed insurrection. Garibaldi took part in the War of the Farrapos and the Uruguayan Civil War leading the Italian Legion, and...
and Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...
. While absorbing the lessons of art and literature, Slobodkin developed a guiding interest in biology, which he pursued first at Bethany College
Bethany College (West Virginia)
Bethany College is a private liberal arts college located in Bethany, West Virginia, United States. Founded in 1840, Bethany is the oldest institution of Higher Education in West Virginia.-Location:...
in West Virginia, and later under G. Evelyn Hutchinson
G. Evelyn Hutchinson
George Evelyn Hutchinson FRS was an Anglo-American zoologist known for his studies of freshwater lakes and considered the father of American limnology....
at Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
, where he received his doctorate in 1951 at the age of 23 .
After completing his Ph.D.
Ph.D.
A Ph.D. is a Doctor of Philosophy, an academic degree.Ph.D. may also refer to:* Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*Piled Higher and Deeper, a web comic strip*PhD: Phantasy Degree, a Korean comic series* PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
, Slobodkin worked for two years for the United States Fish and Wildlife Service
United States Fish and Wildlife Service
The United States Fish and Wildlife Service is a federal government agency within the United States Department of the Interior dedicated to the management of fish, wildlife, and natural habitats...
, where he developed a novel, theoretically informed hypothesis for the origin of red tides. He then joined the faculty of the University of Michigan
University of Michigan
The University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...
in the Department of Zoology in 1953. In 1968 he moved to the State University of New York at Stony Brook.
Among his many other activities, Slobodkin held a key post as instructor and director of a marine ecology course, taught at the Marine Biological Laboratory
Marine Biological Laboratory
The Marine Biological Laboratory is an international center for research and education in biology, biomedicine and ecology. Founded in 1888, the MBL is the oldest independent marine laboratory in the Americas, taking advantage of a coastal setting in the Cape Cod village of Woods Hole, Massachusetts...
at Woods Hole
Woods Hole, Massachusetts
Woods Hole is a census-designated place in the town of Falmouth in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, United States. It lies at the extreme southwest corner of Cape Cod, near Martha's Vineyard and the Elizabeth Islands...
for many years in the 1960s, that served as a training ground for prominent ecologists. He was a visiting scholar at Hebrew University, Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv University is a public university located in Ramat Aviv, Tel Aviv, Israel. With nearly 30,000 students, TAU is Israel's largest university.-History:...
, and Ben-Gurion University, as well as the Weizman Institute, in Israel, twice a Guggenheim Fellow, twice a Fulbright Fellow, and a fellow of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars , located in Washington, D.C., is a United States Presidential Memorial that was established as part of the Smithsonian Institution by an act of Congress in 1968...
. He was honored by being elected as Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences is an independent policy research center that conducts multidisciplinary studies of complex and emerging problems. The Academy’s elected members are leaders in the academic disciplines, the arts, business, and public affairs.James Bowdoin, John Adams, and...
and as Foreign Member of the Linnean Society of London
Linnean Society of London
The Linnean Society of London is the world's premier society for the study and dissemination of taxonomy and natural history. It publishes a zoological journal, as well as botanical and biological journals...
. He was president of the American Society of Naturalists
American Society of Naturalists
The American Society of Naturalists was founded in 1883 and is one of the oldest professional societies dedicated to the biological sciences in North America...
in 1985 and the Society for General Systems Research
Society for General Systems Research
The Society for General Systems Research is predecessor of the current International Society for the Systems Sciences , known to be one the first interdisciplinary and international co-operations in the field of systems theory and systems science...
in 1969 .
In 2005, Slobodkin, then Emeritus
Emeritus
Emeritus is a post-positive adjective that is used to designate a retired professor, bishop, or other professional or as a title. The female equivalent emerita is also sometimes used.-History:...
Professor of Ecology and Evolution at Stony Brook University, was named Eminent Ecologist
Eminent Ecologist Award
The Eminent Ecologist Award is prize awarded annually to a senior ecologist in recognition of an outstanding contribution to the science of ecology. The prize is awarded by the Ecological Society of America. According to the statutes, the recipient may be from any country in the world. However, in...
by the Ecological Society of America
Ecological Society of America
The Ecological Society of America is a professional organization of ecological scientists. Based in the United States, ESA publishes a suite of publications, from peer-reviewed journals to newsletters, fact sheets and teaching resources. It holds an annual meeting at different locations in the...
.
Work
Hutchinson, one of the most renowned ecologists of the 20th century, sought broad theoretical principles for ecology, and with his students helped to build a modern theoretical and mathematical framework on foundations that VolterraVito Volterra
Vito Volterra was an Italian mathematician and physicist, known for his contributions to mathematical biology and integral equations....
and Gause had already laid. Slobodkin played an important role in developing this framework via his research, teaching, and his very influential book, Growth and Regulation of Animal Populations, which served as a blueprint for generations of students of ecology at all levels. His doctoral research, a detailed study of the role of age structure in the growth of experimental populations of the microcrustacean Daphnia, epitomized his approach—a quantitative experimental test of a mathematical theory that was intended to apply broadly .
University of Michigan
At the University of MichiganUniversity of Michigan
The University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...
Slobodkin pioneered the use of calorimetry
Calorimetry
Calorimetry is the science of measuring the heat of chemical reactions or physical changes. Calorimetry is performed with a calorimeter. The word calorimetry is derived from the Latin word calor, meaning heat...
as a tool for studying the "efficiency" of energy flow in ecosystem
Ecosystem
An ecosystem is a biological environment consisting of all the organisms living in a particular area, as well as all the nonliving , physical components of the environment with which the organisms interact, such as air, soil, water and sunlight....
s, a field in which his groundbreaking experimental work left a permanent legacy. He initiated a research program on brown and green hydra that explored such problems as the joint role of food and predation
Predation
In ecology, predation describes a biological interaction where a predator feeds on its prey . Predators may or may not kill their prey prior to feeding on them, but the act of predation always results in the death of its prey and the eventual absorption of the prey's tissue through consumption...
on limiting population growth
Population growth
Population growth is the change in a population over time, and can be quantified as the change in the number of individuals of any species in a population using "per unit time" for measurement....
, and the continuum of species interactions that lie between mutualism and parasitism
Parasitism
Parasitism is a type of symbiotic relationship between organisms of different species where one organism, the parasite, benefits at the expense of the other, the host. Traditionally parasite referred to organisms with lifestages that needed more than one host . These are now called macroparasites...
.
Together with Nelson Hairston
Nelson Hairston
Nelson Hairston Sr. was a preeminent ecologist of the 20th century. Hairston is well-known for his work in ecology and human disease. In the field of ecology he is famous for championing the idea of the trophic cascade, on which he published the provocative “Green World Hypothesis” with colleagues...
, Sr. and Frederick Smith, he wrote one of the most influential papers in the history of ecology, a four-page essay in The American Naturalist that is still required reading for many students in this field. Submitted under the title "Étude" (unacceptable to the editors), HSS (as the paper is often referred to, for Hairston, Smith, and Slobodkin) offered a simple but closely reasoned hypothesis for the regulation of populations at each trophic level
Trophic level
The trophic level of an organism is the position it occupies in a food chain. The word trophic derives from the Greek τροφή referring to food or feeding. A food chain represents a succession of organisms that eat another organism and are, in turn, eaten themselves. The number of steps an organism...
in terrestrial ecosystem
Ecosystem
An ecosystem is a biological environment consisting of all the organisms living in a particular area, as well as all the nonliving , physical components of the environment with which the organisms interact, such as air, soil, water and sunlight....
s.
The "world is green", they reasoned, despite the insatiable appetite and enormous diversity of herbivores, because herbivore populations are held in check by their own natural enemies—predators, parasitoid
Parasitoid
A parasitoid is an organism that spends a significant portion of its life history attached to or within a single host organism in a relationship that is in essence parasitic; unlike a true parasite, however, it ultimately sterilises or kills, and sometimes consumes, the host...
s, parasites, and pathogen
Pathogen
A pathogen gignomai "I give birth to") or infectious agent — colloquially, a germ — is a microbe or microorganism such as a virus, bacterium, prion, or fungus that causes disease in its animal or plant host...
s. This hypothesis was both controversial and inspiring, and stimulated much later research on tri-trophic interactions, food web
Food web
A food web depicts feeding connections in an ecological community. Ecologists can broadly lump all life forms into one of two categories called trophic levels: 1) the autotrophs, and 2) the heterotrophs...
dynamics
System dynamics
System dynamics is an approach to understanding the behaviour of complex systems over time. It deals with internal feedback loops and time delays that affect the behaviour of the entire system. What makes using system dynamics different from other approaches to studying complex systems is the use...
, and trophic cascade
Trophic cascade
Trophic cascades occur when predators in a food web suppress the abundance of their prey, thereby releasing the next lower trophic level from predation...
s .
Larry Slobodkin's quick and sophisticated wit, infusing both his conversation and teaching, was legendary. During a lecture at the University of Michigan, held in a basement-level auditorium where the podium was flanked by a door to the building's loading dock, he described the musical genius that blessed successive generations of the Bach family to illustrate principles of heredity
Heredity
Heredity is the passing of traits to offspring . This is the process by which an offspring cell or organism acquires or becomes predisposed to the characteristics of its parent cell or organism. Through heredity, variations exhibited by individuals can accumulate and cause some species to evolve...
. At that moment, a great clattering of garbage cans issued from the loading area. The noise had hardly stopped when Slobodkin quipped, “the janitors here prefer Tchaikovsky” .
State University of New York at Stony Brook
By the time he moved to the State University of New York at Stony Brook in 1968, Slobodkin was one of the most distinguished ecologists in the world. The department he established there - the Department of Ecology and Evolution - was one of the first of its kind, and soon became recognized as a preeminent department in its field under his leadership.While at Stony Brook, Slobodkin served as department chair for five years and directed its graduate program for seven years, in addition to serving as co-editor of The American Naturalist, and writing two more books, most recently A Citizen's Guide to Ecology. Many of the Ph.D. students he mentored first at the University of Michigan and later at Stony Brook went on to become well known ecologists
Ecology
Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems...
, environmental scientists
Environmental science
Environmental science is an interdisciplinary academic field that integrates physical and biological sciences, to the study of the environment, and the solution of environmental problems...
, and evolutionary biologists .
Research accomplishments
Slobodkin's research accomplishments were broad. He was an innovative thinker whose ideas provided the foundations for many topics that are still studied today. His research and writings were infused with erudition and wit that extended to his lectures and conversations. No one who knew him will forget his ability to express an idea, explanation, or his own experiences in the most incisive and humorous way. His ability to recall poetry, biblical references, arcane historical anecdotes, or Jewish jokes to fit any situation was legendary. He was vocally liberal and sensitive to the needs and feelings of immigrants and others who he thought might feel marginalized .When asked to write a piece for the Ecological Society of America
Ecological Society of America
The Ecological Society of America is a professional organization of ecological scientists. Based in the United States, ESA publishes a suite of publications, from peer-reviewed journals to newsletters, fact sheets and teaching resources. It holds an annual meeting at different locations in the...
's series, What Do Ecologists Do?, after receiving the award, Slobodkin wrote, "My own advice on career development is that there are three career paths open and it is wise to excel at one of them: the first is to become an expert on some group of organisms that excites you…. Second, you [could] become very good at the most popular current techniques at the highest technical level you can imagine. In contrast, you can take the third, and most dangerous, path. You can strenuously avoid doing what everyone else is doing and search for new ideas and new tests for old ideas." Larry Slobodkin followed, with intensity, that third and most perilous path .
Publications, a selection
Books- 1980. Growth and Regulation of Animal Populations. 2nd enlarged edition. Dover Press.
- 1992. Simplicity and Complexity in Games of the Intellect. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
- 1998. Beyond Ecological Awareness. Oxford Univ. Press.
- 2003. A Citizen's Guide to Ecology. Oxford Univ. Press.
Articles
- 1960. With N. HairstonNelson HairstonNelson Hairston Sr. was a preeminent ecologist of the 20th century. Hairston is well-known for his work in ecology and human disease. In the field of ecology he is famous for championing the idea of the trophic cascade, on which he published the provocative “Green World Hypothesis” with colleagues...
and Frederick Smith. "Community structure, population control, and competition". In: The American Naturalist. Vol. 94, No. 879, Nov. - Dec., 1960. pp. 421-425 - 1967. With F. E. Smith and N. Hairston sr. "Regulation in terrestrial ecosystems and the implied balance of nature". In: Am. Nat. Vol l0l, pp. l09-l24.
- 1991. With P. Bossert. "The Coelenterates". Chapter 5 in: Ecology and Classification of Freshwater Invertebrates. J.H. Thorpe and A.P. Covich (eds). Academic Press. pp. 125–144.
- 1994. "The connection between single species and ecosystems". In: Water Quality and Stress Indicators: Linking Levels of Organization. D.W. Sutcliffe ed. . Freshwater Biological Association, Ambleside, U.K. pp. 75–87
- 1994. "G. Evelyn Hutchinson, an appreciation". In: J. Animal Ecology. Vol 62: pp. 390–394.
- 1997. With Craig, S.F., G. A. Wray and C. H. Biermann, "The paradox of polyembryony: A review of the cases and a hypothesis for its evolution Evolutionary". In: Ecology, Vol 11, pp. 127–143.