Emiliani, Cesare -

(1922-1995): Italian paleoceanographer who applied Urey's oxygen isotope method to deep-sea sediments recovered during the Swedish Deep-Sea Expedition and by subsequent expeditions carried out by Lamont Geologic Observatory and the University of Miami. He discovered that the temperature of the ocean and the ice masses on Earth changed through time in cycles and showed that these cycles could be recognized and correlated throughout the Atlantic. On the basis of oxygen isotopes in sediment samples from the seafloor he suggested an overall cooling of the deep ocean since Eocene time. Emiliani also pioneered deep drilling into the seafloor for the purposes of climate reconstruction.