A new kind of invisible gold in pyrite...

DizzyDigger

Gold Member
Dec 9, 2012
5,836
11,579
Concrete, WA
Detector(s) used
Nokta FoRs Gold, a Gold Cube, 2 Keene Sluices and Lord only knows how many pans....not to mention a load of other gear my wife still doesn't know about!
Primary Interest:
Prospecting
Found this interesting, but not sure how much pyrite you'd
have to go through to earn a living at it.

Abstract, below, and the full .pdf report is available: here.

"Mining of "invisible gold? associated with sulfides in gold ores represents a significant proportion of gold production worldwide. Gold hosted in sulfide minerals has been proposed to be structurally bound in the crystal lattice as a sulfide-gold alloy and/or to occur as discrete metallic nanoparticles. Using a combination of microstructural quantification and nanoscale geochemical analyses on a pyrite crystal from an orogenic gold deposit, we show that dislocations hosted in a deformation low-angle boundary can be enriched in Ni, Cu, As, Pb, Sb, Bi, and Au. The cumulative trace-element enrichment in the dislocations is 3.2 at% higher compared to the bulk crystal. We propose that trace elements were segregated during the migration of the dislocation following the dislocation-impurity pair model. The gold hosted in nanoscale dislocations represents a new style of invisible gold."

Bit technical for me, but if it's a new source for gold...:icon_thumleft:
 

Upvote 0

Top Member Reactions

Users who are viewing this thread

Top