Peter B. deMenocal

Professor
Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences

Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University
Palisades, New York 10964

(845) 365-8483 (office)
(845) 365-8722 (lab)
(845) 365-8483 (fax)

 

peter@ldeo.columbia.edu

I am a paleoceanographer/marine geologist who uses geochemical analyses of marine sediments to understand how and why past climates have changed.

Current research projects include deep-sea sediment core investigations into the timing and abruptness of tthe African Humid Period between 10,000-5,000 years ago, a time when North Africa was much wetter than today. Our group is also developing paleoceanographic records of ocean temperature and salinity variations along meridional and zonal sediment core transects to place contraints on the amplitudes climate zone shifts in the past.

I've had a continuing interest in Pliocene-Pleistocene African paleoenvironmental changes and their relationships to evolutionary junctures in human evolution as well as understanding the role of the tropical oceans in the mid-Pliocene onset and amplification of glacial cycles.

Abrupt Climate Change Research at Lamont

Updated: October 3, 2008