global climate changes). The latest version of the chronostratigraphic scale is available on the website of the International Commission on Stratigraphy: http://www.
stratigraphy.org/.
For paleoclimatologists, geochronology has provided a
time scale entirely independent of astronomical parameters.
This has allowed the Milankovitch theory to be validated, a
work that has been a focus of attention of geochemists over
the last forty years. Currently, a major experimental effort is
underway to try to improve the dating accuracy and to detect
the phase shifts that accompany the response of various
components of climate system to the insolation forcing.
50
H. Guillou