72 surface sediments associated with manganese nodules from 31 sites in the Central Pacific Ocean were obtained during CCOP/SOPAC cruises in 1980, and from the core collections at the University of Hawaii, Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Lament Doherty Geological Observatory. Prior to chemical analysis, sediment samples were examined in smear slides. Bulk chemical analyses of air-dried samples were made by atomic absorption spectrophotometry for Mn, Fe, Cu, Ni, Co, Pb. Zn, Ca, Al and Ti. Accuracies, determined by comparison with international nodule standards, were better than 10% for all elements except AI (15%), whilst precisions were generally better than 5%. Zn contamination from core barrels was suspected in some samples, and these results were not used.

This table is digitized from the publications' Appendix B, pp. 450-----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1989 NOAA-NCEI compiled the NOAA-MMS Marine Minerals Geochemical Database from journal articles, technical reports and unpublished sources from other institutions.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.