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Charles David Keeling, a leading authority on atmospheric greenhouse gas accumulation and a climate science pioneer at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego (UCSD), died 20 June 2005, while at his Montana home, after suffering a heart attack. He was 77 years old. Keeling had been affiliated with Scripps since 1956.
Keeling was the first to confirm the rise of atmospheric carbon dioxide by very precise measurements that produced a dataset now known widely as the "Keeling curve." Prior to his investigations, it was unknown whether the carbon dioxide released from the burning of fossil fuels and other industrial activities would accumulate in the atmosphere instead of being fully absorbed by the oceans and vegetated areas on land. He became the first to determine definitively the fraction of carbon dioxide from combustion that remains in the atmosphere. The Keeling record of the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide measured at Mauna Loa, Hawaii, and at other "pristine air" locations, represents what many believe to be the most important time-series dataset for the study of global change.
In 2002, President George W. Bush selected Keeling to receive the National Medal of Science, the nation's highest award for lifetime achievement in scientific research. In its awards announcement, the National Science Foundation (NSF), which administers the National Medals of Science for the White House, noted that Keeling "pioneered studies...