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Dr. Wallace S. Broecker is perhaps the world's leading interpreter of the Earth's operation as a biological, chemical and physical system. His research interests include paleoclimatology, ocean chemistry, isotope dating and environmental science, yet he is probably best known for his identification of a "great conveyor belt" of ocean currents that plays a critical role in earth's climate. His research has shown that the earth's climate has shifted abruptly many times in the past, and he has been a leading voice warning of the potential danger of increased greenhouse gases in earth's atmosphere.

Dr. Broecker has pioneered a number of new approaches to studying the earth's climate, including the use of carbon and other isotopes to date marine sediments. He has examined ocean circulation patterns over time, studied gas exchanges between the ocean and the atmosphere, and traced carbon as it cycles through the earth's chemical, physical and biological systems.

In 1996, Dr. Broecker received the National Medal of Science, the nation's highest scientific award, for "his pioneering contributions in understanding chemical changes in the ocean and atmosphere," as well as for his research on global climate change. That same year he also received the Blue Planet Prize from the Asahi Glass Foundation, Tokyo, for achievements in global environmental research.

Through his association with Gary Comer, the originator of Land’s End Clothing Company, Dr. Broecker has been instrumental in selecting many of the global group of 31 abrupt change mentors. Together Comer and Broecker have pushed to alert the world to the need to quell the rise in the atmosphere’s greenhouse capacity by capturing and storing the CO2 produced by fossil fuel burning.

A member of both the National Academy of Science and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Dr. Broecker is also the author of several text books, including "Chemical Equilibria in the Earth," McGraw Hill, 1971, "Chemical Oceanography," Harcourt Brace, 1974, "Tracers in the Sea," Eldigio Press, 1982, and "How to Build a Habitable Planet," Eldigio Press, 1998.