Gary Calkins
January 18, 1869 - January 4, 1943
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Scientific Discipline: Cellular and Developmental Biology Membership Type:
Member
(elected 1919)
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Protozoologist Gary N. Calkins was a leading figure in the study of single-cell life forms during the first half of the twentieth century. Calkins contributed greatly to our understanding of various unicellular organisms, publishing The Protozoa, the earliest English-language book on the subject, in 1901. Much of his research was on the life cycle of various protozoa, though he also defined several new species and made numerous contributions to the taxonomy of amoebae and ciliates. Early in his career he looked at the role of single-celled life forms in illness among people and fish. He was active in cancer research as a biologist at the New York State Cancer Laboratory.
Gary Calkins was born in Valparaiso, Indiana, in 1869. He graduated from MIT in 1890 with an SB degree and received his PhD from Columbia University in 1897. He taught at MIT from 1890 to 1906. Moving to Columbia University in 1906, he remained there for the rest of his career, retiring in 1939. He was also active for many years at the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole, Massachusetts, where he served as clerk of the corporation.
