Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2plfb Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T08:12:04.410Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Ca-W metasomatism in high-grade matapelites: an example from scheelite mineralization in Kerala Khondalite Belt, southern India

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 July 2018

K. P. Shabeer*
Affiliation:
Department of Geosciences, Osaka City University, Osaka 558-8585, Japan
T. Okudaira
Affiliation:
Department of Geosciences, Osaka City University, Osaka 558-8585, Japan
M. Satish-Kumar
Affiliation:
Department of Geosciences, Osaka City University, Osaka 558-8585, Japan
S. S. Binu-Lal
Affiliation:
Department of Geosciences, Osaka City University, Osaka 558-8585, Japan
Y. Hayasaka
Affiliation:
Department of Geosciences, Osaka City University, Osaka 558-8585, Japan
*

Abstract

Scheelite mineralization in the granulite-facies supracrustal sequences of the Kerala Khondalite Belt, southern India is reported. The supracrustal sequences where the mineralization is found comprise granulite-grade metasediments which underwent metamorphism at ∼550 Ma. The mineralization is assumed to have formed by late-stage metasomatism that overprinted the regional metamorphism of the country rock (garnet-biotite gneiss) and occurs along a quartz vein that intrudes the regional foliation. The paragenetic data from the vein demonstrate unambiguously a separate cycle of hydrothermal activity, resulting in metasomatism and mineralization. Scheelite is found in both the altered host rock along the foliation plane and in the quartz vein. Fluid inclusions preserved in the vein suggest that the mineralizing fluids were saline-aqueous in composition, while those in the country rocks were predominantly CO2-rich. The mineral chemistry and bulk-rock chemical composition of the mineralized domain reveal the unusual enrichment of Ca in the mineralised zone with the depletion of K. We propose that fluid discharging from a crystallizing deep-seated magma, mixing with deep circulating Ca-bearing palaeo-groundwater gave rise to the deposition of scheelite. The scheelite mineralization and the quartz vein emplacement occurred after the Pan-African regional metamorphism.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland 2003

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Barr, J.M. and Reid, D.L. (1993) Hydrothermal alteration at the Haib porphyry copper deposit, Namibia: Stable isotope and fluid inclusion patterns. Communications of the Geological Survey of Namibia, 8, 2334.Google Scholar
Bartlett, J.M., Harris, N.B.W. and Hawksworth, C.J. (1995) New isotope constraints on the crustal evolution of South India and Pan-African granulite metamorphism. Pp. 391397 in: India and Antarctica during the Precambrian (Yoshida, M. and Santosh, M. editors). Geological Society of India Memoir, 34.Google Scholar
Bence, A.E. and Albee, A.L. (1968) Empirical correction factors for the electron microanalysis of silicates and oxides. Journal of Geology, 76, 382403.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bodnar, R.J. and Vityk, M.O. (1994) Interpretation of microthermometric data for NaCl-H2O fluid inclusions. Pp. 117131 in: Fluid Inclusions in Minerals: Methods and Applications (De Vivo, B. and Frezzotti, M.L., editors). Virginia Polytechnic Institute, State University of Blacksburg, VA, USA.Google Scholar
Braun, I., Montel, J.-M. and Nicollet, C. (1998) Electron microprobe dating of monazites from high-grade gneisses and pegmatites of the Kerala Khondalite Belt, southern India. Chemical Geology, 146, 6585.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bromley, A.V. and Holl, J. (1986) Tin mineralization in southwest England. Pp. 159262 in: Mineral Processing at a Crossroads (Willis, B.A. and Barley, R.W., editors). NATO ASI Series, 117. Martinus Nijhoff, Dordrecht, The Netherlands.Google Scholar
Brown, P.E. and Hagemann, S.G. (1995) The program MacFlinCor and its application to geobarometry in Archean lode-gold deposits. Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, 59, 39433952.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brugger, J., Gieré, R., Grobérty, B. and Uspensky, E. (1998) Scheelite-powellite and paranite-(Y) from the Fe-Mn deposit at Fianel, Eastern Swiss Alps. American Mineralogist, 83, 11001110.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carmichael, D.M. (1969) On the mechanism of prograde metamorphic reactions in quartz-bearing politic rocks. Contributions to Mineralogy and Petrology, 20, 244267.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carten, R.B. (1981) Sodium-calcium metasomatism and its time space relationship to potassium metasomatism in the Yerington porphyry copper deposit, Lyon County, Nevada. Unpublished PhD dissertation, Stanford University, 270 pp.Google Scholar
Chacko, T., Lamb, M. and Farquhar, J. (1996) Ultra high temperature metamorphism in the Kerala Khondalite belt. Pp. 157165 in: The Archaean and Proterozoic Terrains in South India within East Gondwana (Santosh, M. and Yoshida, M. editors). Gondwana Research Group Memoir, 3.Google Scholar
Chacko, T., Ravindra Kumar, G.R. and Newton, R.C. (1987) Metamorphic P-T conditions ofthe Kerala (S. India) Khondalite belt, a granulite facies supracrustal terrain. Journal of Geology, 95, 343358.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chaudary, A.K., Harris, N.B.W., van Calsteren, P. and Hawksworth, C.J. (1992) Pan-African chamockite formation in Kerala, South India. Geological Magazine, 129, 257264.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chris, A. and Alldrick, D. (1996) Au-quartz veins, in selected British Columbia mineral deposit profiles. Pp. 5356 in: Metallic Deposits (Lefebure, D.V. and Hoy, T. editors). British Columbia Ministry of Employment and Investment, Open File 1996-13, 2.Google Scholar
Einaudi, M.T., Meinert, D.L. and Newberry, R.J. (1981) Skarn deposits. Economic Geology, 75, 317391.Google Scholar
Gaspar, L.M. and Inverno, C.M.C. (2000) Mineralogy and metasomatic evolution of distal skarns in the Riba de Alva mine, northeastern Portugal. Economic Geology, 95, 12591275.Google Scholar
Geological Survey of India (1995) 1:500,000 Geological and Mineralogical Map of Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Pondicheri. Geological Survey of India, Calcutta.Google Scholar
Grant, J.A. (1986) The isocon diagram-a simple solution to Gresens’ equation for metasomatic alteration. Economic Geology, 81, 9761982.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gresens, R.L. (1967) Composition-volume relationships of metasomatism. Chemical Geology, 2, 4755.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackson, N.J., Halliday, A.N., Sheppard, S.M.F. and Mitchell, J.G. (1982) Hydrothermal activity in the St Just mining district, Cornwall, England. Pp. 137179 in: Metallization associated with Acid Magmatism (Evans, A.M., editor). Wiley & Sons Ltd, London.Google Scholar
Kerrick, D.M. and Jacobs, G.K. (1981) A remodified Redlich-Kwong equation for H2O-CO2 and H2O-CO2 mixtures at elevated pressures and temperatures. American Journal of Science, 281, 735767.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kwak, T.A.P. (1994) Hydrothermal alteration in carbonate-replacement deposits: ore skarns and distal equivalents. Pp. 381402 in: Alteration and Alteration Processes Associated with Ore-forming Systems (Lentz, D.R., editor). Geological Association of Canada, Short Course Notes, 11.Google Scholar
Leboutillier, N.G., Jewson, C. and Shail, R.K. (2000) Mineralogy and paragenesis of the uppermost levels of North Tincroft Lode. 2000 Ussher Society Conference, Devon, UK, Abstracts.Google Scholar
Meinert, L.D. (1992) Skarn and skarn deposits. Geoscience Canada, 19, 145162.Google Scholar
Meinert, L.D., Newberry, R.J. and Einaudi, M.T. (1980) An overview of W, Cu, and Zn-bearing skarns in Western North America. Pp. 303–327 in: Mineral Deposits of the Pacific Northwest Field, (C. and Silberman, M. editors) US Geological Survey Open File Report, 81-355.Google Scholar
Nandakumar, V. and Harley, S.L. (2000) A reappraisal of the pressure-temperature path of granulites from the Kerala Khondalite belt, southern India. Journal of Geology, 108, 687703.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newberry, R.J. (1982) Tungsten-bearing skarns of the Sierra Nevada. I. The Pine Creek mine, California. Economic Geology, 77, 823844.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ravindra Kumar, G.R. and Chacko, T. (1986) Mechanisms of charnockite formation and breakdown in southern Kerala: implications for the origin of southern Indian granulite terrain. Journal of the Geological Society ofIndia, 28, 277288.Google Scholar
Roedder, E. (1984) Fluid Inclusions. Bookcrafters Inc Chelsea, Michigan, 644 pp.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Santosh, M. (1986) Nature and evolution of meta- morphic fluids in the Precambrian khondalites of Kerala, South India. Precambrian Research, 33, 283302.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Santosh, M. (1996) The Trivandrum and Nagercoil granulite blocks. Pp. 243277 in: The Archaean and Proterozoic Terrains of Southern India within East Gondwana (Santosh, M. and Yoshida, M. editors). Gondwana Research Group Memoir, 3.Google Scholar
Satish-Kumar, M. and Harley, S.L. (1998) Reaction textures in scapolite-wollastonite-grossular calc- silicate rock from the Kerala Khondalite Belt, southern India: evidence for high temperature and initial cooling. Lithos, 44, 8399.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sato, K. (1980) Tungsten skarn deposit of the Fugigatani mine, southwest Japan. Economic Geology, 75, 10661082.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scrivener, R.C., Shepherd, T.J. and Garrioch, N. (1986) Ore genesis at Wheal Pendarves and South Crofty Mine, Cornwall–a preliminary fluid inclusion study. Proceedings of the Ussher Society, 6, 412416.Google Scholar
Shabeer, K.P., Sajeev, K., Okudaira, T. and Santosh, M. (2002) Two-stage spinel growth in the high-grade metapelites of the Central Kerala Khondalite Belt: implications for prograde P-T Path. Journal of Geosciences, Osaka City University, 45, 2943.Google Scholar
Shepherd, T.J., Miller, M.F., Scrivener, R.C. and Darbyshire, D.P.F. (1985) Hydrothermal fluid evolution in relation to mineralization in southwest England with special reference to the Dartmoor- Bodmin area. Pp. 345364 in: High Heat Production (HHP) Granites, Hydrothermal Circulation and Ore Genesis (Halls, C. et al., editors). London Institution of Mining and Metallurgy.Google Scholar
Sheppard, S.M.F. (1977) The Cornubian batholith SW England: D/H and 18O/16O studies of kaolinite and other alteration minerals. Journal of the Geological Society, London, 133, 573591.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
So, C.-S., Yun, S.-T. (1994) Origin and evolution of W- Mo-producing fluids in a granitic hydrothermal system: Geochemical studies of quartz vein deposits around the Susan granite, Hwanggangri district, Republic of Korea. Economic Geology, 89, 246267.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Srikantappa, C., Raith, M. and Speiring, B. (1985) Progressive chamockitization of a leptynite-khonda- lite suite in southern Kerala, India: evidence for formation of charnockites through decrease in fluid pressure? Journal of the Geological Society of India, 26, 849872.Google Scholar
Swanenberg, H.E.C. (1979) Phase equilibria in carbonic systems, and their application tofreezing studies of fluid inclusions. Contributions to Mineralogy and Petrology, 68, 303306.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Uspensky, E., Brugger, J. and Graeser, S. (1998) REE geochemistry systematics of scheelite from the Alps using luminescence spectroscopy: from global regularities tofacies control. Schweizerisches Minera log ische und P etrogrograph ische Mitteilungen, 78, 3356.Google Scholar
Wood, S.A. and Samson, I.M. (2000) The hydrothermal geochemistry of tungsten in granitoid environments: I. relative solubilities of ferberite and scheelite as a function of T, P, pH and mNacl. Economic Geology, 95, 143182.Google Scholar
Zahm, A. (1987) The compositional evolution of calc silicates from Salau skarn deposit (Ariége Pyrénées). Bulletin de Minéralogie, 110, 623632.CrossRefGoogle Scholar