Eugene Pleasants Odum Born ( 1913-09-17)September 17, 1913, USA Died August 10, 2002 ( 2002-08-10) (aged 88), USA Residence USA Nationality American Alma mater (Ph.D.) Known for pioneering the concept of the ecosystem; the interdependence of divergent ecosystems as the basis of how the earth functions Awards (1977) (1987) Scientific career Fields, and Institutions Eugene Pleasants Odum (September 17, 1913 – August 10, 2002) was an American at the known for his pioneering work on. He and wrote the popular ecology Fundamentals of Ecology, published in 1953. Is named in his honor. Contents. Biography Son of the and brother of the ecologist, E.P.
Odum credited his father for imparting to him a approach to looking at things. When contemplating his advanced education, he rejected both the and, as he did not feel that this holism was embodied in their approach to their departments. Instead, he chose the Graduate Department of at the where he earned his degree. There Odum was a student of whose efforts led to the establishment of. After getting his Ph.D.
In 1939, Odum was hired to be the first resident biologist at the Edmund Niles Huyck Preserve and Biological Research Station, in. The 430-acre preserve had been founded in 1931 and its research station established in 1938. The Preserve’s first summer research fellows, also selected in 1939, were Edward C. Raney, who had just finished his Ph.D.
At Cornell, studied green frogs and bullfrogs and went on to become a leading (zoologist who studies fish). Griffin, who was completing his Ph.D. At Harvard, did research on bat (he later became famous for that work). Odum and Martha Ann Huff, whom he had met as a student, were married at her home in Wilmette, Illinois, on November 18, 1939. Odum joined her husband in Rensselaerville where he continued to work at the Huyck Preserve. His research included studying chickadees and—more important for his future as an ecologist—inventorying the plants and preparing a habitat map. His purpose was to establish a basis for succession studies of the land so man could plan and manage ecosystems.
In September 1940, Odum took at job as an instructor of biology at the (Athens, Georgia). In the late 1940s, while serving on the University's biology faculty committee, which was then drawing up a new, he perceived an urgent need to incorporate the subject of ecology when he found that his colleagues generally did not know what ecology (in its own right) might be. He had two sons, William Eugene and Daniel Thomas, with his wife Martha. Odum was very proud of Martha's accomplishment as an artist. She often painted landscapes when traveling with her husband across the US and overseas. William died in his 40s, but not before making important contributions to science while a faculty member at the. In 2007 the Institute of Ecology, which Odum founded at the University of Georgia, became the, the first stand-alone academic unit of a research university dedicated to ecology.
Work Ecosystems In the 1940s and 1950s, ' was not yet a field of study that had been defined as a separate discipline. Even professional biologists seemed to Odum to be generally under-educated about how the Earth's ecological systems interact with one another.
Odum brought forward the importance of ecology as a discipline that should be a fundamental dimension of the training of a biologist. Odum adopted and developed further the term '. Although sometimes said to have been coined by in 1942, the term 'ecosystem' first appeared in a 1935 publication by the, and had in 1930 been coined by Tansley's colleague, Roy Clapham. Before Odum, the ecology of specific and environments had been studied on a more limited scale within individual sub-disciplines of biology. Many doubted that it could be studied on a large scale, or as a discipline in itself. Odum wrote a textbook on ecology with his brother, a graduate student.
The Odum brothers' book (first edition, 1953), Fundamentals of Ecology, was the only textbook in the field for about ten years. Among other things, the Odums explored how one natural system can interact with another.
Environmentalism While Odum did wish to influence the knowledge base and thinking of fellow biologists and of college and university students, his historical role was not as a promoter of public as we now know it. However, his dedication in his 1963 book, Ecology, expressed that his father had inspired him to 'seek more harmonious relationships between man and nature'. By 1970, when the first was organized, Odum's conception of the living as a global set of interlaced ecosystems became one of the key insights of the that has since spread through the world.
He was, however, an independent thinker who was at times, gently critical of the slogans and fashionable concepts of the environmentalist movement. Legacy Odum's will stipulated that, after his death, his 26 acres (110,000 m 2) on the Middle in Athens, Ga.
Would be sold and developed according to plans he laid out before his death. He would often show friends and colleagues hand sketched plans for his vision of this green community. Plans included that over 50 percent of the property would be protected greenspace and walking trails, managed by the Oconee River Land Trust. Profits from the sale of the land would go to the Eugene and William Odum Ecology Fund, after $1 million is set aside for a professorial chair at UGA in Odum's name. The land was sold to builder John Willis Homes who is honoring Odum’s wishes at Beech Creek Preserve.
Ultimately, Odum's financial contributions were focused on not only the University of Georgia, but also the University of Virginia given his son's faculty appointment there, and the University of North Carolina where his father was a prolific scholar. Ultimately, his wealth—partly the product of book royalties—benefited those institutions that he respected. Publications Books.
1939. Variations in the heart rate of birds: a study in physiological ecology. 1953. Fundamentals of Ecology. With Howard T. Ecology. 1975.
Ecology, the link between the natural and the social sciences. 1983. Basic Ecology. 1993.
Ecology and Our Endangered Life Support Systems. 1998. Ecological Vignettes: Ecological Approaches to Dealing with Human Predicament. 2000. Essence of Place (co-authored with Martha Odum) Articles, a selection.
1969. (with Alfred E. Smalley) About Odum. Rotabi, K. Ecological theory origin from natural to social science or vice versa?: A brief conceptual history for social work. Advances in Social Work, 8 (1), 113-123. Craige, Betty Jean (2001).
Eugene Odum: ecosystem ecologist and environmentalist. u.a.: Univ. Of Georgia Press. References. The Historical Roots of the Nature Conservancy in the Northwest Indiana/Chicagoland Region: From Science to Preservation. The South Shore Journal, 3.
Archived from on 2016-01-01. Retrieved 2015-11-22. Robbins, Timothy; Collette, Bruce; Robins, Richard (December 18, 1992). Raney, 1909-84'.
1992 (4): 1143–1150. ^ Craige, Betty Jean (2001). Eugene Odum: ecosystem ecologist and environmentalist. u.a.: Univ. Of Georgia Press. ^ Marine, Tom (December 7, 2007).
The Red and Black Publishing Company. Archived from on January 9, 2008. Retrieved 2008-03-25. Tansley, AG (1935).
'The use and abuse of vegetational concepts and terms'. 16: 284–307. Retrieved 2008-03-25. External links Wikiquote has quotations related to:. — of the.
This article is about the American ecologist. For the American sociologist, see. Howard Thomas Odum Born ( 1924-09-01)September 1, 1924, U.S. Died September 11, 2002 ( 2002-09-11) (aged 78), U.S. Alma mater Known for, systems ecology Awards (1987) Scientific career Fields, and Howard Thomas Odum (also known as Tom or just H.T.) (September 1, 1924 – September 11, 2002) was an. He is known for his pioneering work on, and for his provocative proposals for additional laws of thermodynamics, informed by his work on. Contents.
Biography Odum was the third child of the American sociologist, and the brother of. Their father 'encouraged his sons to go into science and to develop new techniques to contribute to. Howard learned his early scientific lessons about birds from his brother, about fish and the while working after school for the Robert Coker, and about electrical circuits from The Boy Electrician.
Howard Thomas studied at the, where he published his first paper while still an undergraduate. His education was interrupted for three years by his service with the in and the where he worked as a tropical. After the war, he returned to the University of North Carolina and completed his in zoology in 1947.
In 1947, Odum married Virginia Wood; they had two children. After her 1973 death, he married Elizabeth C. Odum in 1974; she had four children from her previous marriage. Odum's advice on how to manage a blended family was to be sure to keep talking; Elizabeth's was to hold back on discipline and new rules.
In 1950, Howard earned his Ph.D. In zoology at, under the guidance of. His dissertation was titled The Biogeochemistry of Strontium: With Discussion on the Ecological Integration of Elements. This step took him from his early interest in ornithology and brought him into the emerging field of. Through this a meteorologist 'analysis of the global circulation of strontium, anticipated in the late 1940s the view of the earth as one great.'
While at Yale, Howard began his lifelong collaborations with his brother Eugene. In 1953, they published the first English-language textbook on systems ecology, Fundamentals of Ecology. Howard wrote the chapter on which introduced his. They continued to collaborate in research as well as writing for the rest of their lives. For Howard, his energy systems language (which he called 'energese') was itself a collaborative tool.
Florida Cypress Dome in the Big Cypress National Preserve From 1956 to 1963, Odum worked as the Director of the Marine Institute of the University of Texas. During this time, he became aware of the interplay of ecological-energetic and economic forces. He then taught at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was in the Department of Zoology, and one of the professors in the new Curriculum of Marine Sciences until his move to the University of Florida in 1970 where he taught at the Environmental Engineering Sciences Department, started and directed the Center for Environmental Policy and founded the University's Center for Wetlands in 1973, the first of its kind in the world that is still in operation today. Odum continued this work for 26 years until his retirement in 1996. In the 1960s-1970s Odum was also chairman of the 's Tropical Biome planning committee and was supported by large contracts with the United States Atomic Energy Commission with nearly 100 scientists, which involved radiation studies of a tropical rainforest His featured project at University of Florida in the 1970s was on recycling treated sewage into cypress swamps, one of the first projects that began the now widespread approach of using wetlands as water quality improvement ecosystems. This is one of his most important contributions to the beginnings of the field of ecological engineering.
In his last years, Odum was Graduate Research Professor Emeritus and Director of the Center for Environmental Policy. He was an avid in both his professional and personal life. The Ecological Society awarded Odum its Mercer Award to recognize his contributions to the study of the coral reef on. Odum also received the French Prix de Vie, and the of the Royal Swedish Academy of Science considered the Nobel equivalent for bioscience not originally honored by Nobel himself. Has called Odum one of the most innovative and important thinkers of our time, noting that Howard Odum, either alone or with his brother Eugene, received essentially all of international prizes awarded to ecologists.
The only higher education institute to award both Odum brothers honorary degrees was The Ohio State University which honored H.T. In 1995 and Gene in 1999.
Odum's contributions to this field have been recognised by the who named their experimental station the 'H.T.Odum greenhouse', at the suggestion of his former student Patrick Kangas. Kangas and his student, David Blersch, made significant contributions to the design of the waste water recycling system. Odum's students have carried on his work at institutions around the world, most notably Mark Brown at the, David Tilley and Patrick Kangas at the, Daniel Campbell at the, Enrique Ortega at the in, and Sergio Ulgiati at the. Work done at these institutions continues to evolve and propagate the Odum's concept of. His former students Ohio State University, Portland State University, and Scott W. Nixon University of Rhode Island are among a cadre of former students who have been recognized internationally for their contributions to ecological engineering, ecological economics, ecosystem science, wetland ecology, estuarine ecology, ecological modeling, and related fields.
Joel W Hedgpeth
Work: An overview Odum left a large legacy in many fields associated with ecology, systems, and energetics. He studied ecosystems all over the world, and pioneered the study of several areas, some of which are now distinct fields of research. According to Hall (1995, p.ix), Odum published one of the first significant papers in each of the following areas:. (Odum 1960a). (Odum et al.
1963). (Odum 1971).
(Odum and Hoskins 1958). (Odum and Pidgeon 1970). Odum's contributions to these and other areas are summarized below. Odum also wrote on radiation ecology, unified science, and the.
He was one of the first to discuss the use of ecosystems for life-support function in space travel. Some have suggested that Odum was technocratic in orientation, while others believe that he sided with those calling for 'new values.' Ecological modeling A new integrative approach in ecology In his 1950 Ph.D. Thesis, H.T.Odum gave a novel definition of ecology as the study of large entities (ecosystems) at the 'natural level of integration'. Hence, in the traditional role of an ecologist, one of Odum's doctoral aims was to recognize and classify large cyclic entities (ecosystems). However another of his aims was to make predictive generalizations about ecosystems, such as the whole world for example.
For Odum, as a large entity, the world constituted a revolving cycle with high. It was the presence of stability which, Odum believed, enabled him to talk about the of such. Moreover, at the time of writing his thesis, Odum felt that the principle of was more than, because it had a teleological, that is a 'stability over time' component. And as an ecologist interested in the behavior and function of large entities over time, Odum therefore sought to give a more general statement of natural selection so that it was equally applicable to large entities as it was to small entities traditionally studied in biology. Hence Odum also had the aim of extending the scope and generality of natural selection, to include large entities such as the world. This extension relied on the definition of an as a combination of properties that have some stability with time.
Odum's approach was motivated by 's idea's on the energetics of evolution. Ecosystem simulation In writing a history of the ecosystem concept, Golley noted that Odum tended to think in the form of analogies, and gave the example, 'if the world is a heat engine, then.' In this vein, Odum can be understood as extending the which establish the analogies between electrical, mechanical, acoustical, magnetic and electronic systems, to include ecological systems. Odum used an analog of electrical energy networks to model the energy flow pathways of ecosystems. Odum's analog electrical models had a significant role in the development of his approach to systems and have been recognized as one of the earliest instances of systems ecology.
Electron flow in the electrical network represented the flow of material (e.g. Carbon) in the ecosystem, charge in a capacitor was analogous to storage of a material, and the model was scaled to the ecosystem of interest by adjusting the size of electrical component. Ecological analog of Ohm's Law. Energy Diagram: energy and matter flows through an ecosystem, adapted from the Silver Springs model. H are herbivores, C are carnivores, TC are top carnivores, and D are decomposers. Squares represent biotic pools and ovals are fluxes or energy or nutrients from the system. Is a common type of spring-fed stream in, with a constant temperature and chemical composition.
The study Howard Odum conducted here was the first complete analysis of a natural. Odum started with an overall model and in his early work used a diagramming methodology very similar to the used in chemical process engineering. In this model energy and matter flows through an ecosystem: H are herbivores, C are carnivores, TC are top carnivores, and D are decomposers. Squares represent biotic pools and ovals are fluxes or energy or nutrients from the system. Started from that overall model Odum 'mapped in detail all the flow routes to and from the stream. He measured the energy input of sun and rain, and of all organic matter - even those of the bread the tourists threw to the ducks and fish - and then measured the energy that gradually left the spring. In this way he was able to establish the stream's energy budget'.
Energetics. Main article: Ecological and biological energetics Around 1955 Odum directed studies into which included the effects of radiation on the tropical rainforest at El Verde, Puerto Rico (Odum and Pidgeon), and the coral reefs and ocean ecology at Eniwetok atoll. The Odum brothers were approached by the Atomic Energy Commission to undertake a detailed study of the atoll after nuclear testing. Apparently the atoll was sufficiently radioactive that upon their arrival the Odums were able to produce an image of a coral head by placing it on photographic paper. These studies were early applications of energy concepts to ecological systems. They were exploring the implications of the laws of thermodynamics when used in these new settings. From this view, biogeochemical cycles are driven by radiant energy.
Odum expressed the balance between energy input and output as the ratio of production ( P) to ( R): P-R. He classified water bodies based on their P-R ratios, this separated from ecosystems: 'his measurements of flowing water metabolism were measurements of whole systems. Odum was measuring the community as a system, not adding up the metabolism of the components as Lindeman and many others had done'.
This reasoning appears to have followed that of Odum's doctoral supervisor, G.E.Hutchinson who expressed the view that if a community were an organism then it must have a form of metabolism. However Golley notes that H.T.Odum attempted to go beyond the reporting of mere ratios, a move which resulted in the first serious disagreement in systems energetics. Maximum power theory and the proposal for additional laws of thermodynamics/energetics. Main article: In a controversial move, Odum, together with Richard Pinkerton (at the time physicist at the University of Florida), was motivated by 's articles on the energetics of evolution, and subsequently proposed the theory that natural systems tend to operate at an efficiency that produces the output, not the maximum efficiency.
This theory in turn motivated Odum to propose maximum power as a fundamental thermodynamic law. Further to this Odum also mooted two more additional thermodynamic laws (see ), but there is far from consensus in the scientific community about these proposals, and many scientists have never heard of H.T. Odum or his views. Energese: Energy Systems Language.
Main article: By the end of the 1960s Odum's electronic circuit ecological simulation models were replaced by a more general set of energy symbols. When combined to form systems diagrams, these symbols were considered by Odum and others to be the language of the macroscope which could portray generalized patterns of energy flow: 'Describing such patterns and reducing ecosystem complexities to flows of energy, Odum believed, would permit discovery of general ecosystem principles'. Some have attempted to link it with the projects which have appeared throughout the history of natural philosophy. Of systems ecology developed by Howard Odum and others, 1971. Kitching claimed that the language was a direct result of working with analogue computers, and reflected an electrical engineer's approach to the problem of system representation: 'Because of its electrical analogy, the Odum system is relatively easy to turn into mathematical equations.
If one is building a model of energy flow then certainly the Odum system should be given serious consideration. ' Due to the focus on systems thinking, Odum's language appears to be similar in approach to the recently developed by an international body. Energy quality In taking an energy-based view of hierarchical organization Odum also developed further the systems ecology understanding of. Main article: In the 1990s in the latter part of his career H.T. Odum together with developed the ideas of, as a specific use of the term. Some consider the concept of 'emergy', sometimes briefly defined as 'energy memory', as one of Odum's more significant contributions. However the concept is neither free from controversy nor without its critics.
Odum looked at natural systems as having been formed by the use of various forms of energy in the past: 'emergy is a measure of energy used in the past and thus is different from a measure of energy now. The unit of emergy (past available energy use) is the emjoule, as distinguished from joules used for available energy remaining now.'
This was then conceived as a principle of which might explain the of self-organising open systems. However this principle has only been demonstrated in a few experiments and is not widely recognized in the scientific community. Ecosystem ecology and systems ecology. Main articles: and For J.B. Hagen, the maximum power principle, and the stability principle could be easily translated into the language of and systems. Hagen claims that the feedback loops in ecosystems, were, for Odum, analogous to the kinds of feedback loops diagrammed in electronic circuits and cybernetic systems ( Ibid.).
This approach represented the migration of cybernetic ideas into ecology and led to the formulation of systems ecology. In Odum's work these concepts form part of what Hagen called an, 'ambitious and idiosyncratic attempt to create a universal science of systems' ( Ibid).
The ecosystem concept. Main article: Macroscope Hagen has identified the systems thinking of Odum as a form of holistic thinking. Odum contrasted the holistic thinking of systems science with reductionistic microscopic thinking, and used the term 'macroscope' to refer to the holistic view, which was a kind of 'detail eliminator' allowing a simple diagram to be created. Microcosms H.T.Odum was a pioneer in his use of small closed and open ecosystems in classroom teaching. These small ecosystems were often constructed from fish tanks or bottles and have been called. Odum's microcosm studies influenced the design of.
Scripps Institution Of Oceanography
Hierarchical organization In observing the way higher order have a control function in ecosystems, H.T. Odum arrived at the concept he termed. Ecological economics. Main article: Ecological economics is now an active field between and ecology with annual conferences, international societies and an international journal. From 1956 to 1963 H.T.Odum worked as Director of the Marine Institute of the University of Texas.
During this time Odum became aware of the interplay of ecological-energetic and economic forces. He therefore funded the research into the use of conventional economic approaches to quantify dollar values of ecological resources for recreational, treatment and other uses. This research calculated the potential value of primary production per bay surface area. For Hall the importance of Odum's work came through his integration of systems, ecology, and energy with economics, together with Odum's view that economics can be evaluated on objective terms such as energy rather than on a subjective, willingness to pay basis. Ecological engineering. Main article: Ecological Engineering is an emerging field of study between ecology and concerned with the designing, monitoring and constructing of. The term ecological engineering was first coined by Howard T.
Odum in 1962 well before he worked at the University of Florida. Ecological engineering, he wrote, is 'those cases where the energy supplied by man is small relative to the natural sources but sufficient to produce large effects in the resulting patterns and processes.' Ecological engineering, as a practical field, was then developed by his former graduate student who started and continues to edit the standard journal in the field and helped to start both international and U.S.
Science
Societies devoted to ecological engineering, and has written two textbooks on the subject One of H.T. Odum's last papers was his assessment of ecological engineering that was published in the journal Ecological Engineering in 2003, a year after Odum died. General systems theory.