Faculty Naturally Selects Ecologist Murdoch

By BILL SCHLOTTER

William W. Murdoch, an internationally known ecologist and a faculty member since 1965, has been chosen to receive the highest honor the UCSB faculty can bestow upon one of its own: the annual Faculty Research Lectureship. The award was conferred on March 3 by the Academic Senate on the advice of a selection committee.

Murdoch, the Charles A. Storke II Professor of Ecology in the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology—where he served four years as department chair—was selected for his contributions to the campus, the community, and to science.

"Professor Murdoch has devoted 39 years at UCSB to research, teaching, and service to the university and to the community," said selection committee chair Michael Goodchild, professor of geography and last year's faculty lecturer. "He has grown in stature to become one of the foremost ecologists in the world, and one of our most eminent faculty."

Murdoch said he was honored to be the committee's choice. "I'm grateful to my colleagues for giving me this award," he said. "I have a great affection for UCSB and a loyalty to it. And that makes this award, for me, a really special one."

Murdoch's lecture is free and open to the public and will focus on "The Balance of Nature." He will speak at 4 p.m. on April 14 in Girvetz Hall, Room 1004.

"What is it that makes populations out there stable and not fluctuating all over the place?" Murdoch asked.

"I am going to talk about a particular example that I have worked with for a long time—control of an agricultural pest, the California red scale, by a little wasp. It is a wonderfully stable system."

A native of Scotland, Murdoch came to UCSB after earning a Ph.D. in zoology at the University of Oxford in Britain and completing a post-doctorate assignment at the University of Michigan.

In addition to his professorial duties at UCSB, Murdoch proposed establishment of the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis at UCSB and served as the center's first director. He currently is the director of the UCSB Natural Reserve System.

Away from campus, he has served on many scientific advisory committees as well as on the Marine Review Committee of the California Coastal Commission, and the board of governors of The Nature Conservancy.