born Dec. 17, 1835, Neuchâtel, Switz.
died March 27, 1910, at sea, mid-Atlantic Ocean
Swiss-born U.S. marine zoologist, oceanographer, and mining engineer.
The son of Louis Agassiz , he emigrated in 1849 to the U.S., where he conducted significant systematic zoological work on echinoderm s (e.g., starfish ). He developed and supervised what became the world's foremost copper mine (Calumet, Mich.) while also improving conditions for miners. He also pursued marine and coral reef studies. His observations made on an 1875 trip to the western coast of South America led him to challenge Charles Darwin 's theory of coral reef formation.