Geological and geochemical characteristics of the Zhulazhaga gold deposit in Inner Mongolia, China

Located in Alxa Zuoqi (Left Banner) of Inner Mongolia, China, the Zhulazhaga gold deposit is the first largescale gold deposit that was found in the middle-upper Proterozoic strata along the north margin of the North China craton in recent years. It was discovered by the No. 1 Geophysical and Geochemical Exploration Party of Inner Mongolia as a result of prospecting a geochemical anomaly. By now, over 50 tonnes of gold has been defined, with an average Au grade of 4 g/t. The ore bodies occur in the first lithological unit of the Mesoproterozoic Zhulazhagamaodao Formation (MZF), which is composed mainly of epimetamorphic sandstone and siltstone and partly of volcanic rocks. With high concentration of gold, the first lithological unit of the MZF became the source bed for the late-stage ore formation. Controlled by the interstratal fracture zones, the ore bodies mostly appear along the bedding with occurrence similar to that of the strata. The primitive ore types are predominantly the altered rock type with minor ore belonging to the quartz veins type. There are also some oxidized ore near the surface. The metallic minerals are composed mainly of pyrite, pyrrhotite and arsenopyrite with minor chalcopyrite, galena and limonite. Most gold minerals appear as native gold and electrum. Hydrothermal alterations associated with the ore formation are actinolitization, silicatization, sulfidation and carbonation. A total of 100 two-phase H2O-rich and 7 three-phase daughter crystal-bearing inclusions were measured in seven gold-bearing quartz samples from the Zhulazhaga gold deposit. The homogenization temperatures of the two-phase H2O-rich inclusions range from 155 to 401 degrees C, with an average temperature of 284 degrees C and bimodal distributions from 240 to 260 degrees C and 300 to 320 C respectively. The salinities of the two-phase H2O-rich inclusions vary from 9.22wt% to 24.30wt% NaCl equiv, with a mode between 23 wt% and 24wt% NaCl equiv. Comparatively, the homogenization temperatures of the three-phase daughter crystal-bearing inclusions vary from 210 to 435 degrees C and the salinities from 29.13wt% to 32.62wt% NaCl equiv. It indicates that the ore-forming fluid is meso-hypothermal and characterized by high salinity, which is apparently different from the metamorphic origin with low salinity. It suggests a magmatic origin of the gold-bearing fluid. The delta O-18 values of quartz from auriferous veins range from 11.9 to 16.3 per mil, and the calculated delta(OH2O)-O-18 values in equilibrium with quartz vary from 1.06 to 9.60 per mil, which fall between the values of meteoric water and magmatic water. It reflects that the ore-forming fluid may be the product of mixing of meteoric water and magmatic water. Based on geological and geochemical studies of the Zhulazhaga gold deposit, it is supposed that the volcanism in the Mesoproterozoic might make gold pre-concentrate in the strata. The extensive and intensive Hercynian tectono-magmatic activity not only brought along a large number of ore-forming materials, but also made the gold from the strata rework. It can be concluded that the ore bodies were mainly formed in late hydrothermal reworking stage. Compared with typical gold deposits associated with epimetamorphic elastic rocks, the Zhulazhaga deposit has similar features in occurrence of ore bodies, ore-controlling structure, wall-rock alterations and mineral assemblages. Therefore, the Zhulazhaga gold deposit belongs to the epimetamorphic clastic rock type.