Ruth Dixon Turner was a pioneering U.S. marine biologist and malacologist who became the world's expert on Teredinidae or shipworms, a taxonomic family of wood-boring bivalve mollusks which severely damage wooden marine installations.

Turner held the Alexander Agassiz Professorship at Harvard University

Harvard University

Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

 and was a Curator of Malacology in the University's Museum of Comparative Zoology

Museum of Comparative Zoology

The Museum of Comparative Zoology, full name "The Louis Agassiz Museum of Comparative Zoology", often abbreviated simply to "MCZ", is a zoology museum located on the grounds of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is one of three museums which collectively comprise the Harvard Museum...

, where she also served as co-editor of the scientific journal Johnsonia

Johnsonia

Johnsonia was a publication of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University from 1941-1975. It was founded by William J. Clench who named it after Charles W. Johnson who had been one of the men who convinced Clench to pursue the study of molluscs...

. She graduated from Bridgewater State College

Bridgewater State College

Bridgewater State University is a public liberal-arts college in Bridgewater, Massachusetts, in the United States. It is the largest college in the Massachusetts state university system outside of the University of Massachusetts system. The school's mascot is the bear.-History:BSU was founded by...

, earned a Master's degree at Cornell University

Cornell University

Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...

 and a Ph.D. at Harvard (Radcliffe College

Radcliffe College

Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and was the coordinate college for Harvard University. It was also one of the Seven Sisters colleges. Radcliffe College conferred joint Harvard-Radcliffe diplomas beginning in 1963 and a formal merger agreement with...

) where she specialized in shipworm research.

Turner became one of Harvard's first tenured women professors in 1973, and was one of the most academically successful female marine researchers, publishing over 200 scientific articles and a book during her long career. She was also the first female scientist to use the deep ocean research submarine Alvin

DSV Alvin

Alvin is a manned deep-ocean research submersible owned by the United States Navy and operated by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. The vehicle was built by General Mills' Electronics Group in the same factory used to manufacture breakfast cereal-producing...

. Much of Turner's work was done in co-operation with William J. Clench

William J. Clench

William James Clench was an American malacologist, professor at Harvard University and curator of the mollusk collection in the malacology department of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard.Clench was born in Brooklyn, but was largely raised in Massachusetts. In 1913 he entered the...

. Among other things they jointly described about 70 new mollusk species.