The Marine Biological Station at Port Erin grew out of the Liverpool Marine Biology Committee formed by Professor William Herdman in 1885, which ran a small shore laboratory on Puffin Island before establishing a station at Port Erin in 1892 and moving to its present site at the south-west corner of Port Erin Bay in 1902. From 1919 it was owned and run by the University of Liverpool, hosting generations of marine researchers and student vacation classes, before finally closing in 2006.