Gold-bearing silver and native gold of the Dukat gold-silver deposit

The purpose of the study was to investigate the typochemistry of gold-bearing minerals of the silver-gold series at the Dukat gold-silver deposit (northeast Russia). The methods of optical microscopy and X-ray spectral microprobe analysis were used in the research. The minerals were selected from the most common gold-silver ores at the deposit, which have a predominantly silver composition. It was found out that they are represented mainly by gold-bearing native silver and kustelite. Electrum of low fineness is much less common. The fineness of gold-bearing silver varies in the range of 10–99 ‰ (on average 51 ‰), kustelite – in the range of 101–245 ‰ (on average 149 ‰). The studied electrum separations have low fineness – from 274 to 438 ‰ (on average 357 ‰). The following patterns were revealed in the impurity composition. Gold-bearing silver is characterized by the maximum amount of impurity elements: in addition to gold, these are tellurium, copper, antimony, mercury, lead and iron; selenium, sulfur and bismuth were found in some isolated spots. The total content of all impurities (excluding gold) is also maximum – up to 1.35 wt. %. Kustelite has a slightly lower amount of impurities: tellurium, mercury, antimony, copper and lead; bismuth and selenium are noted in isolated spots. The sum of all impurities is less than 1.23 wt.%. Electrum contains the minimum amount of impurity elements: tellurium, mercury, copper and bismuth; less often it also contains arsenic and selenium. The sum of impurity elements does not exceed 0.67 wt. %. The elemental composition of the impurities and their concentration levels in the studied intermetallic compounds generally reflect the geochemical features of gold-silver ores, predominantly silver in composition, which predominate in the upper-medium ore intervals of the Dukat deposit. The identified typochemical features can be used in exploration to determine the ore-formational identity of the discovered mineralization, and also serve as an additional criterion for assessing the erosional truncation of ore zones and predicting mineralization in depth.

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