Oceanic crust Oceanic crust Oceanic crust is the uppermost layer of the oceanic portion of a tectonic plate. It is composed of the upper oceanic crust, with pillow lavas and a dike complex, and the lower oceanic crust, composed of troctolite, gabbro and ultramafic cumulates. The crust overlies the solidified and uppermost layer of the mantle. The crust and the solid mantle layer together constitute oceanic lithosphere. Oceanic crust is primarily composed of mafic rocks, or sima, which is rich in iron and magnesium. It is thinner than continental crust, or sial, generally less than 10 kilometers thick; however it is denser,
S-layer pores with 2–8 nm in diameter. The terminology “S-layer” was used the first time in 1976. The general use was accepted at the "First International Workshop on Crystalline Bacterial Cell Surface Layers, Vienna (Austria)" in 1984, and in the year 1987 S-layers were defined at the European Molecular Biology Organization Workshop on “Crystalline Bacterial Cell Surface Layers”, Vienna as “Two-dimensional arrays of proteinaceous subunits forming surface layers on prokaryotic cells” (see "Preface", page VI in Sleytr "et al. 1988"). For a brief summary on the history of S-layer research see references For many bacteria, the S-layer represents the outermost interaction