Tschermaks mineralogische und petrographische Mitteilungen

To investigate the diagenetic changes of Tertiary pelitic sediments in the Vienna Basin a suite of drill core samples from the OeMV-bore-hole Aderklaa 78 has been studied using mineralogical and chemical methods. The sediments generally correspond to shales and cover a section from 780–2812 m depth. Their mineralogical composition is complex and variable and mainly due to the initial variation in detrital constituents at the time of sedimentation and the local sedimentary environments. Quartz, feldspars (sodic-plagioclase, K-feldspar), carbonates (calcite, dolomite, siderite), phyllosilicates (mica, chlorite, kaolinite, illite-smectite mixed-layers), and pyrite to a minor extent are the essential components of the shales. The analytical data of bulk samples and the less than 0.2 micron fractions point out that mechanical compaction of the sediments was accom inied by isochemical changes within the shale sequence. The diagenetic overprint of the mineral constituents is revealed by a decrease with depth of K-feldspar and an increase of quartz respectively, but especially by the gradual illitization of smectite via mixed-layer intermediates. Burial diagenesis in this Vienna Basin profile therefore can be expressed by the mineral reaction: K-feldspar+smectite→illite+quartz. A local reversal in all these trends in the basal Tertiary section can be explained by unusually high magnesium contents of the pore waters which inhibited illitization by promoting the stability of smectite relative to illite.

An unusually thick sulfur-poor mineralized zone enriched in platinum-group elements (PGE) is described in the Hanumalapur Complex, Shimoga District, Karnataka State, India. This promising occurrence was discovered in the early 1990s and the best samples at the time of writing have yielded Pt+Pd concentrations in excess of six ppm. The western part of the area concerned belongs to the late Archaean Dharwar Super Group (3000–2500 Ma), while the eastern part is occupied predominantly by a granite-gneiss terrain ∼3000 Ma in age. Ten mafic-ultramafic complexes which host interesting vanadium-bearing titanomagnetite occurrences are encountered in the western part, one of which is the Hanumalapur Complex. The PGE mineralized zone in this complex may be divided into four mineralogically distinctive types, which are, in descending order of PGE content: 1) a silicate-hosted Pd type, 2) a silicate-hosted Pt type, 3) a base-metal sulfide-hosted Pd type, and 4) an oxide-hosted PGE type. The genesis of the mineralization is somewhat unclear at this point of investigation, especially because of complete re-crystallization, but the evidence gathered so far suggests something different than a traditional orthomagmatic model requiring magma mixing processes and resulting in sulfide immiscibility. This is backed-up by the general lack of base metal sulfides in favor of chromite, although pure chlorite-amphibole and chlorite-albite-epidote-amphibole rocks may contain significant PGE concentrations regardless of the amount of chromite. The PGM textures show little evidence of hydrothermal alteration and remobilization, but the PGE mineralogy itself displays some characteristics of fluid action, as it seems that there are some OH-bearing Pt and Pd minerals present.

Crush-leach data were obtained, using High Performance Gradient Ion-Chromatography and Capillary Electrophoresis, on individual generations of aqueous fluid inclusions in hydrothermal quartz from three different auriferous conglomerate horizons (reefs) in the late Archaean Witwatersrand Basin, South Africa. These data, supplemented by oxygen isotope analyses of hydrothermal quartz and in combination with microthermometric analyses, help to constrain the chemical composition, pH, temperature of formation and the possible source of the mineralizing fluid which, in places, was capable of mobilizing some of the primarily detrital gold in the fluvial Witwatersrand sediments. The dominant cations in the aqueous fluid inclusions are Na+ and Ca2+, with Cl− or HCO 3 − being the dominant anion, whereas K+, Mg2+, and SO 4 2− are subordinate. Most fluid inclusions have elevated NH 4 + concentrations which are directly correlated with those of N03. In a number of samples small amounts of organic acids (formate, propionate, and acetate) were also detected. A largely meteoric source is inferred for the gold-mobilizing fluids in the Witwatersrand reefs because of a lack of Br in the fluid, a composition distinctly different from that of seawater, the presence of organic acids, and δ18Ofluid values around O%o. The fluids are ascribed to hydrothermal infiltration triggered by the 2020 Ma Vredefort impact which also created a secondary permeability in the form of a dense network of micro-fractures preferentially in the conglomerate beds of the already metamorphosed Witwatersrand rock sequence. This fluid differs from the regional metamorphic fluid in the basin by having a considerably higher pH (5.7–7.2). The difference in pH might explain why the older, fairly acidic metamorphic fluid was apparently less capable of mobilizing the gold as gold solubility reaches its peak at the pH calculated for the fluid ascribed to the impact.