Hydrothermal ore deposits

Miocene-Pliocene Hydrothermal Ore Deposits in and around the Japanese Islands... 

General overview and classification of hydrothermal ore deposits of Neogene age... 

Main hydrothermal ore deposit types of Neogene age that formed in and around the Japanese Islands are Kuroko deposits and epithermal vein-type deposits. This classification is based on the form of the deposits. 

Figure 1.18. Variation of Fe " /(Fe + Mg) and tetrahedral AI of chlorite from hydrothermal ore deposits Japanese Neogene Cu-Pb-Zn vein-type (open circle) and Kuroko deposits (solid circle). Localities 1 Ashio, 2 Yatani, 3 Toyoha, 4 Kishu, 5 Sayama, 6 Mikawa, 7 Furutobe, 8 Hanaoka, 9 Wanibuchi, 10 western Bergslagen (Shikazono and Kawahata, 1987).

Miocene-Pliocene Hydrothermal Ore Deposits TABLE 1.7 (continued)... 

Precipitation of barite and quartz. Barite and quartz are the most common gangue minerals in the submarine hydrothermal ore deposits such as Kuroko deposits and back-arc basin deposits (e.g., Okinawa, Mariana deposits) (Halbach et al., 1989 Shikazono, 1994 Shikazono and Kusakabe, 1999). These minerals are also common in midoceanic ridge deposits. 

The above lines of evidence suggest that the precipitation of minerals in. submarine hydrothermal ore deposits on the seafloor is taking place from the fluids with high flow rate at the orifices of the chimney (ca. 1-10 m/s) and with high degree of supersaturation under the non-equilibrium conditions. 

However, as already noted, the barite content in Kuroko ore inversely correlates to the quartz content and the occurrences of barite and quartz in the submarine hydrothermal ore deposits are different. The discrepancy between the results of thermochemical equilibrium calculations based on the mixing model and the mode of occurrences of barite and quartz in the submarine hydrothermal ore deposits clearly indicate that barite and quartz precipitated from supersaturated solutions under non-equilibrium conditions. Thus, it is considered that the flow rate and precipitation kinetics affect the precipitations of barite and quartz. 

A comparison of the calculated results (Figs. 1.53 and 1.54) with the mode of occurrences of quartz and barite in the submarine hydrothermal ore deposits indicates... 

The results of calculations are in agreement with the occurrences of barite and silica and chemical features of discharging fluids in the submarine hydrothermal ore deposits namely, quartz is inferred to precipitate in subseafloor environment and barite in seabottom environment. 

The above-mentioned consideration indicates that important factors controlling the precipitations of barite and silica are surface area/water mass ratio (A/M), temperature, precipitation rate constant (k) and flow rate (u), and the coupled fluid flow-precipitation models are applicable to understanding the distributions of minerals in submarine hydrothermal ore deposits. 

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