The studied material consists of foraminiferal tests derived from various research projects (Table 1). The Faeroes samples were collected during expeditions under the BIOFAR programme (Nørrevang et al. 1994). The Galathea samples were collected during the Danish deep-sea expedition 1950-1952 (Bruun 1959), the West Greenland samples were collected from a transect in the Disko area (unpublished material) and the Gulf of Aqaba samples were collected by H.J. Hansen and others (Reiss and Hottinger 1984; Hottinger et al. 1993). Between 600 and 1500 foraminiferans from each of the 200 samples were examined with a scanning electron microscope for evidence of bioerosion.

The Pleistocene samples investigated were collected by KSSN on the Greek island of Rhodes. These samples were taken from a 40 m high section located at Tsambika beach. The section is interpreted as a transgressive marine sequence, referable to the Lindos Bay clay facies group of the Rhodes Formation (Hanken et al. 1996) and represents a steep inner to outer shelf environment of water depth between 200 and 1000 m. A preliminary interpretation of the foraminiferal data suggests that the bottom water was somewhat deficient in oxygen at the time of deposition.

Type material is housed in the Geological Museum, University of Copenhagen, using numbers with the prefix MGUH.