The Rio Grande Rise and Jean Charcot Seamount Chain - microcontinents or the trail of the Tristan-Gough hotspot? Cruise No. MSM 82, 18 March 2019 - 24 April 2019, Montevideo (Uruguay) - Montevideo (Uruguay), RIOGRANDE

Rio Grande Rise: microcontinent, mantle plume, or both? The origin of the Rio Grande Rise (RGR) is debated. It could represent a continental sliver, or a large igneous province that was emplaced in the late Cretaceous after the opening of the South Atlantic Ocean. The interplay between the RGR and the nearby Jean Charcot Seamount Chain (JCSC) is also not understood. Cruise MSM82 dredge sampled rocks from the JCSC and the RGR and measured two seismic refraction profiles across the RGR where it is bisected by a long rift graben. A range of geophysical data were also collected during much of the expedition, including magnetics, gravity, bathymetry (Kongsberg EM 122), sub-bottom profiling (ATLAS PARASOUND DS P70) and ADCP data. The combination of geochronological, geochemical and geophysical information will provide a unique window on the relation between mantle plumes, continental fragments and the evolution of large igneous provinces

Multibeam bathymetry processed data (Kongsberg EM712 entire dataset) of RV MARIA S. MERIAN during cruise MSM66, Baffin Bay, North Atlantic Ocean

Multibeam data were collected during RV Maria S. Merian cruise MSM66 (2017-07-22 to 2017-08-28). Multibeam sonar system was Kongsberg EM 712 multibeam echosounder. Data are processed with Caris HIPS, including sound velocity correction with SV data from CTDs, tidal correction with TPXO9_atlas_v5 (https://www.tpxo.net/global/tpxo9-atlas), and manual cleaning. The soundings are combined in daily files, the format is XYZ ASCII ( ). Additional blockmedian grids have been computed with depth dependent cell size to visualize the data. These grids are not meant for scientific analysis or navigation, but for overview purposes only

Multibeam bathymetry processed data (Kongsberg EM 122 entire dataset) of RV MARIA S. MERIAN during cruise MSM66, Baffin Bay, North Atlantic Ocean

Multibeam data were collected during RV Maria S. Merian cruise MSM66 (2017-07-22 to 2017-08-28). Multibeam sonar system was Kongsberg EM 122 multibeam echosounder. Data are processed with Caris HIPS, including sound velocity correction with SV data from CTDs, tidal correction with TPXO9_atlas_v5 (https://www.tpxo.net/global/tpxo9-atlas), and manual cleaning. The soundings are combined in daily files, the format is XYZ ASCII ( ). Additional blockmedian grids have been computed with depth dependent cell size to visualize the data. These grids are not meant for scientific analysis or navigation, but for overview purposes only

Multibeam bathymetry processed data (Kongsberg EM 122 entire dataset) of RV MARIA S. MERIAN during cruise MSM81, Falkland Plateau, South Atlantic Ocean.

Multibeam data were collected during RV Maria S. Merian cruise MSM81 (2019-02-02 to 2019-03-15). Multibeam sonar system was Kongsberg EM 122 multibeam echosounder. Data are processed with Caris HIPS, including sound velocity correction with SV data from SVPs and World Ocean Atlas 13 (https://doi.org/10.7289/v5f769gt), tidal correction with TPXO9_atlas_v5 (https://www.tpxo.net/global/tpxo9-atlas), and manual cleaning. The soundings are combined in daily files, the format is XYZ ASCII ( ). Additional blockmedian grids have been computed with depth dependent cell size to visualize the data. These grids are not meant for scientific analysis or navigation, but for overview purposes only