We report here preliminary results from the detailed sampling of granitic basement at a depth of 4.000 m at the lower edge of the Armorican continental margin near 48°N and 12°W. We consider that we have sampled here the extreme lateral limit of the continental crust where local exposures emerge from under a cover of Cainozoic,Mesozoic and probable Palaeozoic sediments.

From 1983 until 1989 NOAA-NCEI compiled the NOAA-MMS Marine Minerals Geochemical Database from journal articles, technical reports and unpublished sources from other institutions. At the time it was the most extended data compilation on ferromanganese deposits world wide. Initially published in a proprietary format incompatible with present day standards it was jointly decided by AWI and NOAA to transcribe this legacy data into PANGAEA. This transfer is augmented by a careful checking of the original sources when available and the encoding of ancillary information (sample description, method of analysis...) not present in the NOAA-MMS database.

Supplement to: Pautot, Guy; Renard, V; Auffret, Gérard A; Pastouret, L; De Charpal, O (1976): A granite cliff deep in the North Atlantic. Nature, 263(5579), 669-672