Ruth Patrick

Ruth Patrick (born November 26, 1907, Topeka, Kansas, U.S.—died September 23, 2013, Lafayette Hill, Pennsylvania) was an American aquatic biologist and educator widely regarded as one of the early pioneers of the science of limnology. She is best known for her work with diatoms (a type of algae encased in a glasslike shell) and her efforts in deploying multidisciplinary teams of researchers to assess and monitor aquatic ecosystems.

Patrick grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, the youngest daughter of Frank Patrick, a lawyer, and Myrtle Jetmore Patrick. Her passion for nature was kindled by her father through frequent trips to nearby streams and the observation of diatoms through one of his hobby microscopes. She attended Coker College in South Carolina, receiving a bachelor’s degree in biology in 1929. She later enrolled at the University of Virginia to study botany, earning a master’s degree in 1931 and a Ph.D. in 1934.

Between 1933 and 1945, she volunteered at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia. She began her tenure as a researcher but became the associate curator of microscopy in 1939. In 1937 she began to consolidate the academy’s diatom collection, augmenting it by collecting species in the field and by acquiring species from other sources. Part of her efforts included the development of a filing system that organized new diatom taxa and literature; the system grew over the course of her career and helped the academy’s diatom herbarium become one of the world’s largest collections of these organisms. In 1945 she accepted a full-time position at the academy as the head of microscopy. In 1966 Patrick and fellow researcher Charles Reimer published the first volume of The Diatoms of the United States Exclusive of Alaska and Hawaii, the classic two-volume series describing the taxonomy of this group of organisms. (The second volume was published in 1975.)

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Through her education and research, Patrick recognized the value of diatoms as pollution indicators in streams and sediments. In 1947 she founded the academy’s limnology department. One of the department’s first projects was a biological survey of the streams in the Conestoga River basin near Lancaster, Pennsylvania. This project was one of the first to employ a team of researchers with expertise in various subfields of aquatic biology, chemistry, and physics to survey ecosystems. Several researchers in other states quickly adopted her multidisciplinary approach.

Later in her career, her interests expanded to include applied ecology, biodiversity, and conservation. In 1970 she explored the possibility of using tidal flats and wetlands as natural wastewater-treatment systems. This research inspired watershed-management projects around the world to include provisions for constructed wetlands. She also forged partnerships with government and industry with the goal of improving environmental stewardship. She became a consultant to several corporations and sat on the governing boards of Pennsylvania Power and Light and the DuPont Company.

Patrick was a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 1972 she received the Eminent Ecologist Award from the Ecological Society of America, and in 1996 she was given the American Society of Limnology and Oceanography’s Lifetime Achievement Award and the National Medal of Science.