Combined study of Au-bearing arsenopyrite of orogenic gold deposits (NE Asia): High resolution 3D X-ray computed tomography, LA-ICP-MS, and EMPA data

Abstract

The distribution of gold in small acicular arsenopyrite of a pyrite-arsenopyrite association from Suzdal (Eastern Kazakhstan), Olympiada (Yenisei Ridge, Russia) and large pseudorhombic arsenopyrite crystals from Bazovskoe (Yakutia, Russia) orogenic-type deposits were investigated. On orogenic gold deposits in NE Asia, occurring mainly in black shales, two productive stages of ore deposition are distinguished, which correspond to two morphological varieties of arsenopyrite. At the early stage, fine-grained acicular-prismatic arsenopyrite with invisible gold was deposited; at the late stage, tabular arsenopyrite in association with free visible gold was formed. The samples of gold-bearing arsenopyrite were analyzed using Scanning Electron Microscopy, Electron Microprobe Analyses, Atomic Absorption and Laser Ablation Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry in combination with High Resolution 3D X-ray Computed Tomography (HRXCT). HRXCT does not destroy the studied mineral during the investigation. That technique permits to do an estimation of the amount of gold inclusions in minerals or host rocks and draw reasonable conclusions about the gold content of the ores, to study in detail the distribution patterns of metal inclusions (associated with certain minerals, cracks, crystal growth faces, etc.) and to determine the form of the gold. It can be used to understanding of the genesis of productive mineral associations, and to developing optimal technological schemes for gold extraction.

Keywords

High resolution 3D X-ray / Computed tomograph / Gold-bearing arsenopyrite / Suzdal at East Kazakhstan / Olympiada and Bazovskoe (Russia) / Orogenic gold deposits

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Evgeny Naumov: Writing – review & editing, Writing – original draft, Resources, Methodology, Investigation, Data curation, Conceptualization. Yuri Kalinin: Resources, Data curation, Conceptualization. Galina Palyanova: Writing – review & editing, Formal analysis, Conceptualization. Lyudmila Kryuchkova: Visualization, Methodology, Investigation. Viacheslav Voitenko: Methodology, Investigation. Vera Abramova: Visualization, Methodology, Investigation. Franco Pirajno: Writing – review & editing, Methodology, Conceptualization.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Acknowledgements

This paper is to the treasured memory of Konstantin Kovalev, an outstanding geologistand researcher who devoted many years to studying the ore deposits. The HRCT studies of the samples were carried out jointly with colleagues within the framework of the Research Agreement with the Saint Petersburg State University No С-103/11 signed 08.09.2017. We are grateful to them for their cooperation. We thank the anonymous reviewers and editors for their comments and suggestions, which helped to improve the manuscript. The work was carried out with financial support for the project by the Russian Federation represented by the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia (project number 13.1902.24.44, agreement number 075-15-2024-641).

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