Tellurides in Au deposits: Implications for modelling

Gold in Devono-Carboniferous red beds of northern Britain

“…The association of tellurium and gold is typically encountered in magmatic, metamorphic and hydrothermal deposits (Cook & Ciobanu 2005;Ciobanu et al 2006), Similarly, the association of mercury and gold is one normally associated with magmatic systems, metamorphic rocks and placer deposits derived from these rocks by erosion (Healy & Petruk 1990;Naumov & Osovetsky 2013). The data reported here show that temperature is not a constraint, and that where tellurium and/or mercury are available, regardless of temperature gold may be linked to them.…”

Geology of the Sandaowanzi telluride gold deposit of the northern Great Xing’an Range, NE China: Geochronology and tectonic controls

“…Heald et al, 1987;White and Hedenquist, 1990;Cooke and Simmons, 2000;John, 2001). Highly enriched gold tellurides (Pals and Spry, 2003;Cook and Ciobanu, 2005;Cook et al, 2007) are often related to low sulfidation (Cooke and McPhail, 2001;Pals and Spry, 2003) mineralization. In rare cases, the tellurides may provide up to 50% of the mining gold budget.…”

“…An association between alkaline magmatism and telluridebearing epithermal mineralization has often been assumed (Cook et al, 2009), although there are also well-studied examples of telluride-enriched epithermal mineralization in calc-alkaline volcanic rocks (e.g. Cooke and McPhail, 2001;Cook and Ciobanu, 2005).…”

Geochronological and He–Ar–S isotopic constraints on the origin of the Sandaowanzi gold-telluride deposit, northeastern China

“…Generally in epithermal deposits sulfides are frequently reported as the dominant ore minerals in association with native gold; whereas significant dominance of tellurides accompanying gold is less observed. However, when highly concentrated throughout, or in limited parts of a deposit, Au-(Ag) tellurides may themselves constitute highly economic ores (Cook and Ciobanu, 2005;Cook et al, 2009). In numerous large gold deposits worldwide, Au-(Ag) tellurides comprise an abundant component of ore minerals and may also contribute a significant portion of the overall gold balance, such as observed in the Cripple Creek and Golden Sunlight deposits in USA (Thompson et al, 1985;Porter and Ripley, 1985), the Emperor deposit in Fiji (Ahmad et al, 1987;Pals and Spry, 2003), the Dongping and Dashuigou deposits in China (Mao et al, , 2003, the Acupan and Baguio deposits the GHR region (Fig.…”