Milutin Milankovic

world famous scientist from Belgrade University

virtual exhibition

The Rome Academy of Sciences held two meetings on April 8th and 9th 1949 to discuss the problem of Ice Ages. The records were published in 1950 in a separate volume, and they fully accepted Milankovic’s theory.

Fifty years had passed since Milankovic received his doctorate on December 17th 1954 and the Academic Senate of the High Technical School in Vienna decided to award Milankovic with a golden doctoral diploma as he had successfully contributed to the development of technical sciences and had thus increased the reputation of this great school.

He was then invited to give a lecture on June 01st 1955, which he accepted. He held a lecture at the High Technical School in Vienna and at the large amphitheater of the Vienna University, and the text of the lecture was published in the Archaeologia Austriaca entitled Erforschung der Chronologie der Eiszeit.

The book by John Imbrie and Katharine Palmer Imbrie entitled Ice Ages: Solving the Mystery gives the central spot to Milutin Milankovic.

Milankovic was the first to use the language of mathematics to describe the drift of the continental parts of the Earth’s crust and its impact on the shift in continental climate zones of the Earth, which in interaction with astronomical elements determine the Earth’s climate. He defined the following cycles:

• Periodical changes in the position of the Earth’s axis in cycles of 22,000 years
• Periodical changes of the Earth’s orbital eccentricity due to the mutual influence of planets in cycles of 105,000 years
• Periodical changes in the ecliptic tilt due to the mutual influence of planets in cycles of 41,000 years and graphically presented the amount of insolation (solar curve) which different regions of the Earth had received over 650,000 years.



In 1971, the international, interdisciplinary project CLIMAP, in which geochemical and paleonthological methods were used to analyze bore-holes in the Indian Ocean, in its final report of Hays J. D., Imbrie J. and Shackelton N. finally confirmed Milankovic’s theory. The overall results showed that: climate has varied periodically in the past 500,000, depending on the spectrum of changes in cycles of 23,000 years (change in the Earth’s tilt), 42,000 years (change in the position of the Earth’s axis) and around 100,000 years (the Earth’s orbital eccentricity). It was proven that, if we disregard human influence, the further progress of insolation will lead the Earth’s northern hemisphere into the initial stages of a new ice age in the following several thousand years.





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Last change: 06/19/2009 11:38

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