Canadian-Born American Biologist 1930-1972

Robert Helmer MacArthur was born in Toronto, Canada. MacArthur was an important scientist in the field of ecology, the study of the relation between living creatures and their natural environment. When MacArthur started his studies in ecology, it was a merely descriptive science. Under his influence, ecology developed into a science based on quantitative, or measurable, data.

MacArthur moved to the United States at the age of seventeen to study at Marlboro College in Vermont, where his father was a professor of genetics. In 1951 he earned a bachelor's degree, in the field of mathematics, from Marlboro. Two years later, in 1953, he achieved his master's degree in mathematics from Brown University. While pursuing a Ph.D. at Yale, MacArthur switched from mathematics to zoology, with a concentration on ecology. After receiving his Ph.D. in 1957, MacArthur spent a year in England...