Robert E. Ulanowicz was trained as a chemical engineer at Johns Hopkins University in his hometown of Baltimore. After teaching engineering for two years at Catholic University in Washington, he changed disciplines to become assistant professor at the University of Maryland’s Chesapeake Biological Laboratory. There, he spent his career developing tools to analyze ecosystem trophic networks. He discovered that causality in ecosystems is unlike that in physics, which led to his interest in the philosophy of science and its relationship to religion. He was the recipient of the 2007 Ilya A. Prigogine Medal for excellence in ecosystem dynamics. He retired as professor emeritus from the University of Maryland and lives with his wife, Marijka, in Gainesville, Florida, where he continues to write and publish as courtesy professor in Biology with the University of Florida.
