Metallogenic fingerprint of a metasomatized lithospheric mantle feeding gold endowment in the western Mediterranean basin

Title
Metallogenic fingerprint of a metasomatized lithospheric mantle feeding gold endowment in the western Mediterranean basin
Publication Date
2021-09-20
Author(s)
Schettino, Erwin
Marchesi, Claudio
González-Jiménez, José María
Saunders, Edward
( author )
OrcID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6728-789X
Email: jsaund26@une.edu.au
UNE Id une-id:jsaund26
Hidas, Károly
Gervilla, Fernando
Garrido, Carlos J
Type of document
Journal Article
Language
en
Entity Type
Publication
Publisher
Geological Society of America
Place of publication
United States of America
DOI
10.1130/b36065.1
UNE publication id
une:1959.11/71910
Abstract

Spinel peridotite xenoliths (one plagioclase-bearing) hosted in alkaline basalts from Tallante (southeast Spain) record the mineralogical and geochemical fingerprint of the subcontinental lithospheric mantle (SCLM) evolution beneath the southern Iberian margin. Mantle metasomatism in fertile lherzolites caused the crystallization of clinopyroxene + orthopyroxene + spinel clusters through the percolation of Miocene subalkaline melts during the westward migration of the subduction front in the western Mediterranean. In the Pliocene, heat and volatiles provided by alkaline host-magmas triggered very low melting degrees of metasomatic pyroxene-spinel assemblages, producing melt quenched to silicate glass and reactive spongy coronae around clinopyroxene and spinel. Refertilization of the Tallante peridotites induced the precipitation of base-metal sulfides (BMS) included in metasomatic clino- and orthopyroxene. These sulfides consist of pentlandite ± chalcopyrite ± bornite aggregates with homogeneous composition in terms of major elements (Ni, Fe, Cu) and semi-metals (Se, As, Te, Sb, Bi), but with wide variability of platinum-group elements (PGE) fractionation (0.14 < PdN/IrN < 30.74). Heterogeneous PGE signatures, as well as the presence of euhedral Pt-Pd-Sn-rich platinum-group minerals (PGM) and/or Au-particles within BMS, cannot be explained by conventional models of chalcophile partitioning from sulfide melt. Alternatively, we suggest that they reflect the incorporation of distinct populations of BMS, PGM, and metal nanoparticles (especially of Pt, Pd, and Au) during mantle melting and/or melt percolation. Therefore, we conclude that Miocene subalkaline melts released by asthenosphere upwelling upon slab tearing of the Iberian continental margin effectively stored metals in metasomatized domains of this sector of the SCLM. Remarkably high Au concentrations in Tallante BMS (median 1.78 ppm) support that these metasomatized domains provided a fertile source of metals, especially gold, for the ore-productive Miocene magmatism of the westernmost Mediterranean.

Link
Citation
Geological Society of America Bulletin, 134(5-6), p. 1468-1484
ISSN
1943-2674
0016-7606
Start page
1468
End page
1484
Rights
Attribution 4.0 International

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