One of the main objectives of the International Phase of Ocean Drilling (IPOD) of the Deep Sea Drilling Project was to determine the geological, geochemical, and geophysical character of ocean crust formed at mid-ocean spreading ridges. A series of drill holes along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (MAR), from near Iceland south to approximately 22°N latitude, was planned to compare the crust being generated near an anomalous ridge (Iceland) with that originating near a normal slow-spreading ridge (22°N). At the same time, a series of holes in near zero-age crust at 22 °N was planned along a "flow line" (a transect parallel to local fracture zones) trending west into increasingly older crust, eventually extending the sampling to crust of apparent Jurassic date off the eastern United States coast. This age-transgressive transect was designed to test the evolution of crust formed at one point in the spreading ridge. The intersection of these two series of holes was designated Atlantic Site 5 and was positioned on the upper western flank of the Mid Atlantic Ridge near 22 °N latitude, as close as possible to the spreading ridge crest. The R/V Kana Keoki conducted a detailed 22-day survey of Atlantic Site 5 during Cruise 74-01-01, Leg 7 prior to the DSDP Leg45 was conducted.

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1989 NOAA-NCEI compiled the NOAA-MMS Marine Minerals Geochemical Database from journal articles, technical reports and unpublished sources from other institutions.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.