Faults lead to gold: WA study

[Glass]

Faults lead to gold: WA study

Find a fault in the earth’s crust and you could find some gold, West Australian researchers say.
After studying the St Ives Goldfields, researchers concluded small-scale fault systems had a strong correlation with the location of gold.
The research revealed all major gold deposits were controlled by faults, but small systems were more likely to lead to gold than larger ones.
CSIRO researcher Carsten Laukamp said the relationship between fault systems and gold traces was crucial to understanding the creation of gold and could be used to help find other commodities.
“Determining the spatial relationship between geological features such as fault lines, and gold traces, is not only important to understand how deposits form, it can also guide mineral exploration because we can use this information to develop predictive mineral maps,” he said.


The team developed a predictive mineral map of the St Ives Goldfields that showed areas where there was a high chance of gold being located.

Information about rock type, colour, shape, size and geological boundaries were collated to develop the map.
“Next, we’ll incorporate data collected from aircrafts and satellites, such as geophysical and spectroscopic data, which will improve the information value and accuracy of the predictive mineral map,” Dr Laukamp said.

interesting story (http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/17607726/faults-lead-to-gold-wa-study/)

[mamboni]

This sort of agrees with Roubin who says that people who own gold are at fault for our economic woes.

[gunDriller]

note to readers: this applies to Geographic faults, not human faults.

if it applied to human faults, i'd be following Obama around, taking soil samples, looking for Gold.

[JohnQPublic]

Find a rainbow and it leads to a pot of gold Irish Leprechauns say...

[palani]

Look for evidence of black smokers. Hot springs are tell-tale evidence.

Beware of moguls seeking investment for ocean bottom nodule harvesting ships. They are likely looking to harvest UFOs or Soviet era subs instead.

[gunDriller]

Look for evidence of black smokers. Hot springs are tell-tale evidence.

Beware of moguls seeking investment for ocean bottom nodule harvesting ships. They are likely looking to harvest UFOs or Soviet era subs instead.

i think oceanic gold mining would be a lot of fun.

a la "Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea"

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/5174wGSDRzL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_AA300_SH20_OU01_.jpg

http://www.amazon.com/Ship-Gold-Deep-Blue-Sea/dp/080214425X

one of the lessons learned from that ... a good 'operating procedure' is ... you don't tell nobody nothin.'

keeping his operation secret from other shipwreck-hunters was one of the most interesting parts of the story. Tommy Thompson, the engineer who ran the operation & made it happen, had to keep the location secret until they could establish ownership of the ship-wreck site.

[mamboni]

note to readers: this applies to Geographic faults, not human faults.

if it applied to human faults, i'd be following Obama around, taking soil samples, looking for Gold.

I'm being literal, yes? I'm referring to Roubini, erstwhile economist and lackey-shill for the central banksters and Wall Street.

[gunDriller]

I'm being literal, yes? I'm referring to Roubini, erstwhile economist and lackey-shill for the central banksters and Wall Street.

we could just mug Roubini when he stops at the ATM.

[EE_]

I'm being literal, yes? I'm referring to Roubini, erstwhile economist and lackey-shill for the central banksters and Wall Street.

It's to be expected...

Nouriel Roubini was born in Istanbul, Turkey, to Iranian Jewish parents.[2] When he was an infant, his family lived briefly in Iran and Israel. From 1962 to 1983 he resided in Italy, especially in Milan, where he attended the local Jewish school and then the Bocconi University, earning a B.A., summa cum laude, in economics. He received his Ph.D. in international economics from Harvard University in 1988, where his adviser was Jeffrey Sachs.[2] He is a U.S. citizen and speaks English, Persian, Italian, Hebrew, and conversational French.

[vacuum]

I wonder why exactly gold is located on smaller faults.

[gunDriller]

I wonder why exactly gold is located on smaller faults.

i wonder if it has anything to do with the presence of streams & rivers, on smaller faults.

not that all streams & rivers have gold in them. but some do.

[aeondaze]

I wonder why exactly gold is located on smaller faults.

Lower volumetric flow rates lead to longer residence times within the fault resulting in increased crystalisation of gold/other metal associations from the aqueous aurate complexes. Seems to make sense.

[vacuum]

Lower volumetric flow rates lead to longer residence times within the fault resulting in increased crystalisation of gold/other metal associations from the aqueous aurate complexes. Seems to make sense.

So you're basically saying that veins of gold which are mined are aqueous precipitates and they form on these fault because they are primary seep points? But the actual source of the gold itself is not from deep underground but rather there are gold atoms randomly spread everywhere and they require water to carry them to common deposit locations?

[aeondaze]

So you're basically saying that veins of gold which are mined are aqueous precipitates and they form on these fault because they are primary seep points? But the actual source of the gold itself is not from deep underground but rather there are gold atoms randomly spread everywhere and they require water to carry them to common deposit locations?

Yes and no. Veins of gold are predominantly aqueous precipitates, these 'gold' complexes leach out of the surrounding gold bearing ore bodies under high pressure and temperatures along with other metaliferous and silicious compounds, which is why quartz is often found in association with veins containing gold along with copper, arsenic, lead etc. These hydrothermal gold bearing solutions traverse along fault lines and eventually cool and precipitate out. The no part pertains to radomness. Whilst it may appear their dispersion is random in nature it would correlate highly with the surounding mineralogy either presently or at some point in the past when these gold containg minerals existed within the surounding geology.