The World Paleointensity Database
The paleointensity database was initially constructed by Maseru Kono and Hidefumi Tanaka (Japan). Only absolute paleointensity determinations were considered (igneous rocks and baked contacts) and entries in the database correspond to cooling units. All methods of paleointensity determinations were considered as well as all polarity (normal, reverse or transitional data). The initial structure of the database was quite simple (ASCII files) and therefore very easy to use but information for each result was rather restricted. Mike McElhinny created an Access database from these files with 1123 data from 83 references.
Since 1995, Mireille Perrin (France) took charge of maintaining the database with the help of Elisabeth Schnepp (Germany) for the update of the 0-5 Ma interval and Valera Shcherbakov for Russian data. In the new version of the database, the same idea of simplicity was kept but new information has been added about the sampling site as [Continent] and [Country] to allow easy data selection. Also the type of rocks and the method used for age determination have been included. To 2000 year, the IAGA Paleointensity DatabaseE comprised 1692 data from 117 references ftp://ftp.ngdc.noaa.gov/Solid_Earth/Paleomag/access/ver3.5/ access2000/PINT00.MDB)
For the last 12 years, a number of new determinations were performed in different countries by different researches. So, for the common use, Valera Shcherbakov and Natalia Sycheva took the task of updating the IAGA Paleointensity Database keeping close contact with Mireille Perrin. The updated version was named World Paleointensity Database. To the present moment, the World Paleointensity Database comprises 4287 data from 307 references.
The World Paleointensity Database