Edith Berkeley

Who was Edith Berkeley?

Edith Berkeley was a Canadian marine biologist.

Berkeley completed a pre-medical course at the University of London, where she attended on scholarship.

In 1918, she gave up a paid position as zoology assistant at Columbia University to work as a volunteer for the Pacific Biological Station at Nanaimo in British Columbia Canada. As a volunteer she would be able to perform field work, whereas in a paid position, her work would be included under her husband's name. Though she was never officially on staff, her research on polychaetes brought prestige to the Station and established her as a world authority on the subject.

Her husband Cyril Berkeley left his own research to help her in 1930. They wrote 34 papers together, and she published an additional 12 in her own name. Many organisms have been named after them.