Alfred J. Lotka

Alfred James Lotka (March 2, 1880 – December 5, 1949) was a US mathematician, physical chemist, and statistician, famous for his work in population dynamics and energetics. An American biophysicist best known for his proposal of the predator-prey model, developed simultaneously but independently of Vito Volterra. The Lotka-Volterra model is still the basis of many models used in the analysis of population dynamics in ecology.

Life

Lotka was born in Lwów, Austria-Hungary, formerly part of Poland. His parents, Jacques and Marie (Doebely) Lotka, were US nationals and he was educated internationally. He received a B. Sc. in 1901 at the University of Birmingham, England, he did graduate work 1901-02 at Leipzig University, he received an M.A. in 1909 at Cornell University and an D. Sc. at Birmingham University after his work there from 1909 to 1912.