Larry B. Liddle is Professor Emeritus of Biology and Marine Sciences from Southampton College of Long Island University and, at present, a visitor at the Marine Science Research Center of Stony Brook University at Southampton. Dr. Liddle received his B. A. at Albion College in Michigan, his M. S. in Botany at the University of Chicago and Ph.D. in Marine Botany at the University of California at Santa Barbara. It was during a summer course at the esteemed Marine Biological Laboratory on Cape Cod that he became interested in the relatively unexplored field of seaweed biology. The course turned this mid-Western boy into a marine biologist.

Dr. Liddle’s life in teaching and research has been carried out at the University of Puerto Rico and at Southampton College. It has also included many collaborations during summers and on sabbatical leaves in such places as Las Universidad Autonoma in Montevideo, Uruguay, where he was on a Fulbright Scholar; William and Mary College; The University of Tsukuba in Japan; The University of California at Santa Cruz; and at the prestigious Max-Planck Institute for Cell Biology in Ladenburg, Germany. For the past five years he has worked with coral reef biologists and phycologists at the Phuket Marine Biological Center and Prince of Songkla University in Thailand. .

In 1978 Dr. Liddle along with other colleagues began taking students to study coral reefs on a January travel course to Israel, the Caribbean and the South Pacific including the Great Barrier Reef. No matter where he travels Dr. Liddle collects seaweeds and makes dried pressed specimens for use in research and teaching. Generations of students have poured over his herbarium specimens to study the taxonomy of local and exotic seaweeds.

Dr. Liddle has also been active in scientific societies which promote research and teaching. He was a representative to the Executive Council of the American Institute of Biological Sciences;. He has served in many elected positions in the local Northeast Algal Society and the Phycological Society of America including having been president of both societies. He was elected as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science with the citation: “For research in macro-algal development, for service to the field of Phycology, and for representation of U.S. science abroad.”

Dr. Liddle points out seaweeds interest him because they are evolutionarily very old and have unique strategies for survival. They also have special biochemical features many of which have been exploited for commerce. His work has ranged from ecological aspects to cell biology. Even so he carries on the tradition of being a generalist. He collects seaweeds and makes pressed specimens as a pleasurable professional activity.