National Geochemical Survey of Australia: Sample Preparation Manual

The National Geochemical Survey of Australia (NGSA) aims to collect samples from 1529 sites located in 1390 catchments (10% of which are sampled in duplicate) covering over 90% of Australia. At each site, two depth ranges are sampled, giving 3058 samples to be processed. Each sample results in 13 individually packaged sub-samples, meaning that 39,754 separate containers will be prepared, labelled, delivered to the laboratories or archived during the sample preparation phase of the project. Any excess fraction in the processing streams is kept for potential future use.


The detailed procedures for preparing the NGSA samples in the laboratory are described with an overview of Quality Assessment/Quality Control and Operational Health and Safety measures also provided.


There are three main parts to the sample preparation protocol.


The first part is the Bulk Sample stream.

The sample is received from the field, weighed, dried (for a minimum of 48h at 40°C) and sieved through a 4.75 mm mesh to remove any foreign material. The sample is then homogenised and split into two halves. One half is sealed and set aside for archiving for future analyses/investigations. The other half is split into sub-samples or aliquots for:

1. laser particle size analysis (LPSA), pH 1:5 (soil:water) and electrical conductivity (EC) 1:5 (soil:water) analysis; and

2. X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis.


The remainder of the bulk material is sieved through a 2mm mesh, and split into two portions (~20% and ~80%), which are processed in the following two streams.


The second part is the Coarse Fraction stream.

In this stream, the ~20% split of <2 mm sample prepared above is further split to prepare two aliquots for:

- platinum group element (PGEs) analysis; and

- gold (Au) analysis after aqua regia (AR) leach.


The third part is the Fine Fraction stream.

In this stream, the ~80% split of <2 mm sample prepared above is sifted using small stainless steel riffle splitters. The sample <75 um fraction is split into 5 different aliquots (splits) for different analyses. These aliquots are ranked in order of decreasing priority.

Simple

Identification info

Date (Publication)
2009-01-01T00:00:00
Citation identifier
Geoscience Australia Persistent Identifier/https://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/68657

Cited responsible party
Role Organisation / Individual Name Details
Publisher

Geoscience Australia

 Canberra
Author

de Caritat, P.

 1
Author

Cooper, M.

 2
Author

Lech, M.

 3
Author

McPherson, A.

 4
Author

Thun, C.

 5
Name

Record

Issue identification

2009/008

ISBN

9781921498503

Point of contact
Role Organisation / Individual Name Details
Custodian

MNHD
Owner

Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)
Custodian

Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)

 Voice
Topic category
  • Geoscientific information

Extent

N
S
E
W


Maintenance and update frequency
Unknown

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

Keywords

  • GA Publication

  • Record

Theme

  • geochemistry

Theme

  • regolith

Theme

  • mineral exploration

Keywords

  • AU

Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classification (ANZSRC)

  • Earth Sciences

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
OnLine resource

Download the Record (pdf)

Download the Record (pdf)

Distribution format

  • pdf

Resource lineage

Statement

Unknown

Hierarchy level
Non geographic dataset
Other

GA Publication

Description

Source data not available.

Metadata constraints

Title

Australian Government Security ClassificationSystem

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

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

Classification
Unclassified

Metadata

Metadata identifier
urn:uuid/a05f7892-dc3d-7506-e044-00144fdd4fa6

Title

GeoNetwork UUID

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

Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)

 Voice

Type of resource

Resource scope
Document
Name

GA Record

Alternative metadata reference

Title

Geoscience Australia - short identifier for metadata record with

uuid

Citation identifier
eCatId/68657

Metadata linkage

https://ecat.ga.gov.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/a05f7892-dc3d-7506-e044-00144fdd4fa6

Date info (Revision)
2018-04-20T06:23:10
Date info (Creation)
2009-02-18T00:00:00

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

geochemistry mineral exploration regolith

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