Odum, Eugene Pleasants (1913–2002)

US ecologist and educator. Turning from an early interest in birds to ecology; he became one of the founders of a rigorously scientific approach to ecology and was an influential advocate of resource conservation. His Fundamentals of Ecology appeared in 1971.

Odum was born in Lake Sunapee, New Hampshire. The son of a prominent sociologist, he graduated from the University of North Carolina (1934) and received a PhD from the University of Illinois (1939). He was resident biologist at a New York State nature preserve before joining the faculty of the University of Georgia in 1940. He became an emeritus professor at Georgia in 1985.