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Lower crustal resistivity signature of an orogenic gold system

Orogenic gold deposits provide a significant source of the world’s gold, but their depth of formation is contentious. One hypothesis is that orogenic gold deposits formed along crustal faults over a wide range of depths spanning sub-greenschist to granulite facies. Other authors suggest that the source is restricted to a smaller range of crustal depths (~20-30 km) and temperatures (~550⁰C) that correspond to the transition from greenschist to amphibolite metamorphic facies. Rapid burial of C and S-rich oceanic sediments and amphibolite-grade metamorphism leads to the production of large amounts of fluid in a short amount of time. In order to help discriminate between these competing hypotheses, we compiled thirty years of magnetotelluric (MT) and geomagnetic depth sounding (GDS) data across western Victoria and south-eastern South Australia. This region contains one of the world’s foremost and largest orogenic gold regions that has produced 2% of historic worldwide gold production. Three-dimensional inversion of the MT and GDS data shows a remarkable correlation between orogenic gold deposits with >1 t production and a <20 ohm.m low-resistivity region at crustal depths >20 km. Such depths are at the pressures and temperatures of greenschist to amphibolite-grade metamorphism that releases HS- ligands for Au from C and pyrite (FeS2) rich sediment interbedded with mafic oceanic rocks. Carbon is then precipitated through retrograde hydration reactions with CO2 precipitating as conductive flake graphite. Thus, our model indicates that orogenic gold in western Victoria is most likely sourced from C and FeS2 rich oceanic sediments at amphibolite-grade facies.


Citation: Heinson, G., Duan, J., Kirkby, A. et al. Lower crustal resistivity signature of an orogenic gold system. Sci Rep 11, 15807 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-94531-8

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Identification info

Date (Revision)
2021-02-03
Date (Publication)
2024-10-01T05:32:05
Citation identifier
Geoscience Australia Persistent Identifier/https://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/145106

Identifier

Codespace

Digital Object Identifier

Cited responsible party
Role Organisation / Individual Name Details
Author

Heinson, G.

External Contact
Co-author

Duan, J.

MEG Internal Contact
Co-author

Kirkby, A.

MEG Internal Contact
Co-author

Robertson, K.

External Contact
Co-author

Thiel, S.

External Contact
Name

Nature Geoscience, Scientific Reports (Sci Rep) V11, 15807 (2021)

Purpose

Paper for submission in Nature Geoscience

Status
Completed
Point of contact
Role Organisation / Individual Name Details
Resource provider

Minerals, Energy and Groundwater Division

External Contact
Point of contact

Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)

Voice
Point of contact

Duan, J.

MEG Internal Contact
Spatial representation type
Topic category
  • Geoscientific information

Extent

Extent

N
S
E
W


Maintenance and update frequency
As needed

Resource format

Title

Product data repository: Various Formats

Website

Data Store directory containing the digital product files

Data Store directory containing one or more files, possibly in a variety of formats, accessible to Geoscience Australia staff only for internal purposes

theme.ANZRC Fields of Research.rdf
  • EARTH SCIENCES

  • Ore Deposit Petrology

  • GEOPHYSICS

  • Electrical and Electromagnetic Methods in Geophysics

Keywords
  • Published_External

Resource constraints

Title

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence

Alternate title

CC-BY

Edition

4.0

Website

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/

Access constraints
License
Use constraints
License

Resource constraints

Title

Australian Government Security ClassificationSystem

Edition date
2018-11-01T00:00:00
Website

https://www.protectivesecurity.gov.au/Pages/default.aspx

Classification
Unclassified
Language
English
Character encoding
UTF8

Distribution Information

Distributor contact
Role Organisation / Individual Name Details
Distributor

Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)

Voice facsimile
OnLine resource

Link to journal

Link to journal

Distribution format

Resource lineage

Statement

Publication using data from AusLAMP Victoria and South Australia, as well as other legacy magnetotelluric datasets

Metadata constraints

Title

Australian Government Security Classification System

Edition date
2018-11-01T00:00:00
Website

https://www.protectivesecurity.gov.au/Pages/default.aspx

Classification
Unclassified

Metadata

Metadata identifier
urn:uuid/035dbcf7-8897-44e3-8bbe-99a496cb8505

Title

GeoNetwork UUID

Language
English
Character encoding
UTF8
Contact
Role Organisation / Individual Name Details
Point of contact

Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)

Voice
Point of contact

Duan, J.

MEG Internal Contact

Type of resource

Resource scope
Document
Name

Journal Articles and Conference Papers

Alternative metadata reference

Title

Geoscience Australia - short identifier for metadata record with

uuid

Citation identifier
eCatId/145106

Metadata linkage

https://ecat.ga.gov.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/5167d912-6784-4371-9938-3931e84ca6f1

Metadata linkage

https://ecat.ga.gov.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/035dbcf7-8897-44e3-8bbe-99a496cb8505

Metadata linkage

https://ecat.ga.gov.au/geonetwork/accessDenied.jsp/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/035dbcf7-8897-44e3-8bbe-99a496cb8505

Date info (Creation)
2019-04-08T01:55:29
Date info (Revision)
2019-04-08T01:55:29

Metadata standard

Title

AU/NZS ISO 19115-1:2014

Metadata standard

Title

ISO 19115-1:2014

Metadata standard

Title

ISO 19115-3

Title

Geoscience Australia Community Metadata Profile of ISO 19115-1:2014

Edition

Version 2.0, September 2018

Citation identifier
https://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/122551

 
 

Spatial extent

N
S
E
W


Keywords

theme.ANZRC Fields of Research.rdf
EARTH SCIENCES Electrical and Electromagnetic Methods in Geophysics GEOPHYSICS Ore Deposit Petrology

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