Prepared by:
Dr. Abdel Monem Soltan
Ph.D.
Ain Shams University, Egypt
Map of world showing the distribution of major
deposits.
Metallogeny and plate tectonics
The new concept of plate tectonics recognized that the lithosphere is divided into
a number of rigid plates, which display considerable lateral movement. The
engine of plate tectonics is convective cooling of the mantle. The resulting
lithosphere is in part recycled back into the mantle. Extensional and
compressional interactions at plate boundaries are the cause of profusely fertile
metallogenetic systems.
1- The formation of intracontinental rifts, aulacogens and large sedimentary
basins (incipient divergent plate boundaries - Extensional setting)
Rifts originate by extensional
deformation of lithospheric plates
and may or may not evolve into a
new plate boundary. Rifting causes:
i) thinning of the crust, ii) upflow of
hot mantle and iii) updoming of rift
shoulders.
Volcanic activity within the rifts is
often organized into large volcanic
centres hot spots. Hot spots can
be the origin of three diverging rifts
(triple junction). Two of the three rift
arms may widen to form a new
ocean, whereas the third remains
inactive and is called a failed rift
arm.
Several failed rift arms display thick
sediments. Also, considerable
intrusive activity may occur.
Settings like this have been called
aulacogens (failed arm).
Crustal extension causes the earth's crust to rift, creating horsts and grabens.
This basin and range topography occurs along a normal fault.
Africa is thought to have been
split by a series of rift valleys in
various states of development.
Those in East Africa are still in
thick crust. Those in West Africa
are associated with thick oil-
bearing sediments. In the Red Sea
area the rifting has gone so far as
to form a narrow ocean. In the
south-east Madagascar has been
completely separated from Africa
by rifting.
If continents rift apart to form ocean basins,
other oceans must close. This may be
repeated throughout Earth history. Example:
the IAPETUS ocean between England &
Scotland in the Lower Palaeozoic, closed in
the Caledonian; later opening of the Atlantic,
almost in the same place.
The cycle is known as the Wilson Cycle:
1.Rifting of continents by mantle diapirism;
2.Continental drift, seafloor spreading &
formation of ocean basins;
3.Progressive closure of ocean basins by
subduction of ocean lithosphere;
4.Continental collision and final closure of
ocean basin.
Wilson Cycle
1. Sediments of continental rifts include
terrestrial/alluvial clastic infill that
can contain uranium, placers and
coal deposits.
2. Freshwater, saline or marine-
influenced lake stage succeeds with
beds of salt, gypsum, magnesite,
phosphate, valuable clays or oil
shale.
3. Full marine ingression into the
widening rift and inception of oceanic
spreading can induce submarine
metalliferous exhalation of the black
smoker or brine pool type (Red Sea)
and the deposition of thick marine
sedimentary sequences.
4. Hot spot-related ore-forming systems
include the Bushveld in South Africa, Progressive formation of a rift valley through extension of
tin-fertile A-granites in Nigeria, many the lithosphere and continental crust. Uprise and
decompression of the underlying asthenosphere results in
alkali carbonatite igneous complexes magma formation. The crust responds by brittle fracture.
with apatite, fluorine, niobium and Early rift sediments are downfaulted into the developing rift
(graben). Erosion takes place on the sides of the rift valley.
5. Rifts can be sites of thick clastic
sedimentation. These sediments
hold vast amounts of inter-
granular salt water (brines). The
brines may be in contact with
reducing sediments, such as
carbonaceous shales, which are
also a ready supply of
sulphur/sulphate. As the
sediments compact, these brines
are expelled and can move laterally
for large distances until they move
up the rift faults. Having been Prominent ore provinces include the
buried deep the brines get hot, and European Copper Shale which is
can be very corrosive. So en route formed this way.
they can dissolve considerable
amounts of metals. When they rise
up the rift faults, the brines cool
down and allowing metals to
precipitate out. This can be
enhanced because oxidising
meteoric water (groundwater) may
also penetrate down these faults,
so metals will be precipitated out
6. When rifting reaches the stage of a
deep graben with vertical
displacement at marginal faults (well
into the upper mantle in some
cases), hydrothermal convection
systems may form. The ascending
branch of these hydrothermal
systems typically results in deposits
of lead, zinc, silver, manganese,
fluorine and barite, in the form of
veins and metasomatic replacement
bodies in rift margin rocks, or of ore
beds in the graben sediments. Good
examples are many Pb-Zn and Mn
occurrences in Tertiary sediments on
both sides of the Red Sea.
7. Flood basalt volcanism may be a
result of volcanism producing giant
Cu-Ni-PGE deposits.
8. Placer gold and Mississippi Valley
type (MVT) lead-zinc-barite fluorite
deposits are also possible in the rift
2- The evolution of passive continental margins and the disruption of older ore
provinces (divergent plate boundaries - Extensional setting)
The opening of new oceans passes from a high heat-flow rift stage into a marine
transgression and thermal contraction phase. Relatively shallow, epicontinental
seas may form. As the young ocean widens, passive continental margins develop.
Typical marine epicontinental shelf ore
deposits include:
1.salt, phosphate and hydrocarbon
source rocks;
2.manganese ore beds;
3.metalliferous marine placers; and
4.banded iron ores of the Superior
type.
Epicontinental sea inland/epriric
sea is a shallow sea that covers central
areas of continents (e.g., Caspian Sea
the largest lake on the Earth).
Schematic illustration of the major geological characteristics of mineral
deposit types that typically occur in ore-forming environments within the
interior regions of continents. (IOCG: iron oxide-copper-gold)
3- Seafloor spreading and the production of new lithosphere at mid-ocean ridges
(oceanic divergent, or constructive plate boundaries - Extensional setting)
This concerns ore formation at mid-
ocean ridges and in Ophiolites. After
obduction, the products of these
processes are ophiolite-hosted
deposits. Many ophiolites, however,
were not formed at mid-ocean rifts but
in tensional settings including back-arc
spreading systems, or rifts of primitive
island arcs (e.g. the Cyprus ophiolite).
Related ores are:
1.sulphide mounds or mud pools;
2.iron-manganese oxides (ochres and
numbers); and
3.distal manganese crusts and nodules
with important contents of Cu, Ni and
Co.
Incipient rifting of stable continental crust where
thinning and extension may be related to hotspot
activity. Magmatism is often localized along old
sutures and is alkaline or ultrapotassic (kimberlites
and lamproites) in character. Anorogenic granites
such as those of the Bushveld Complex (Sn, W, Mo,
Cu, F, etc.), pyroxenitecarbonatite intrusions such
as Phalaborwa (CuFePUREE etc.), and
kimberlites (diamonds) represent ore deposits
formed in this setting. Intracontinental rifts can host
SEDEX-type PbZnBaAg deposits (Fig. a).
As continental rifting extends to the point that
incipient oceans begin to open (such as the Red
Sea; Fig. b), basaltic volcanism marks the site of a
mid-ocean ridge and this site is also accompanied
by exhalative hydrothermal activity and plentiful
VMS deposit formation. Such settings also provide
the environments for chemical sedimentation and
precipitation of banded iron-formations and
manganiferous sediments. Continental platforms
host organic accumulations that on catagenesis
give rise to oil deposits. Carbonate sedimentation
ultimately provides the rocks which host MVT
deposits, although the hydrothermal processes that
give rise to these epigenetic PbZn ores are
typically associated with circulation during
compressional stages of orogeny.
Mid-ocean ridges are the culmination of extensional
processes (Fig. c). Exhalative activity at these sites
gives rise to black-smoker vents that provide the
environments for the formation of Cyprus type VMS
deposits. The basalts which form at mid-ocean
ridges also undergo fractional crystallization at sub-
volcanic depths to form podiform chromite deposits
as well as CuNiPGE sulfide segregations.
4- Subduction of lithospheric plates at convergent (destructive) plate
boundaries (Compressional settings)
Subduction recycles oceanic lithosphere back into the mantle. The trace of
subduction on the seafloor is marked by deep oceanic trenches. Volcanic/Island
arcs develop on the overriding plate.
Volcanic arcs in dominantly oceanic settings form
island arcs, whereas active continental margins display
continental or Cordilleran arcs.
There is a great diversity of subduction zone
configurations, due to many variables including slab
density, thickness and length. Subduction zones show
variously:
1.high or low trench ward plate velocities;
2.trench retreat (or more rarely trench advance)
velocities;
3.slab dip angles and so forth.
When two huge masses of
When two oceanic plates collide, continental lithosphere meet head-
the plate that is older, therefore on, neither one can sink because
colder and denser, is the one that both plates are too buoyant.
The dense, leading edge of the will sink.
oceanic plate pulls the rest of the
plate into the flowing
asthenosphere and a subduction
zone is born!
It is important to stress
that most of the Earths
richest ore provinces
are found above
subduction zones.
A- The highly significant Andean type
(ocean-continent) collisional margins are
the sites of the great porphyry CuMo
provinces of the world, while inboard of
the arc significant SnW granitoid-
hosted mineralization also occurs. The
volcanic regions above the porphyry Metallogeny of active continental
systems are also the sites of epithermal margins with the typical zonation.
precious metal mineralization (gold).
B- A similar tectonic setting can exist
between two slabs of oceanic crust
(ocean-ocean collision). In this
environment, porphyry CuAu deposits
occasionally occur associated with the
early stages of magmatism in these
settings, whereas the later, more
evolved calcalkaline magmatism gives
rise to Kuroko-type VMS deposits. The
back-arc basins represent the sites of
Besshi type VMS deposition.
C- Arcarc collision in the back-arc environment can
also result in the preservation of obducted oceanic
crust within which podiform Cr and sulfide
segregations might be preserved.
4- Continental collision
D- As the arc and continent accrete
(become closer), ophiolite obduction
can occur, and felsic magmatism may
give rise to large-ion lithophile element
mineralization (LILE: Ba, K, Rb, Cs, Ca,
Sr). Ultimately, the oceanic crust is
totally consumed to form a zone of
continentcontinent collision. The
process results in thickened crust below
collisional belts and the formation of
anatectic S-type granitoid melts.
From these melts, SnWU
mineralization could occur.
In addition, orogeny-driven
fluids give rise to orogenic
vein-related Au systems
(orogenic gold deposits)
which could be associated
with MVT PbZn deposits.
