History

Abstract

Modern biological science tends to regard ecological microcosms and other similar objects as relative newcomers on the research scene. Indeed, most of the serious scientific literature dates no earlier than 1960 and the technique was not named microcosmology until 1980 (Giesy and Odum 1980). However, the philosophy behind the microcosm concept can be traced back to the ancient Greeks and some very good science was done on containerized living systems prior to 1960. In this chapter, we trace the history of the concept and consider some of the early work.