Organic Matter and Mineralisation: Thermal Alteration, Hydrocarbon Generation and Role in Metallogenesis

This book demonstrates the direct link between petroleum, the derivative of organic materials, and ore bodies. The studies reported here highlight the common factors between hydrocarbons and mineral concentrations, such as heat sources, migration routes and likely traps. It emphasizes the role that hydrothermal processes play in the genesis of both petroleum generation and ore-grade mineralization. The presence of oil residue in the form of bitumen and pyrobitumen in all sediment-hosted ore bodies throughout the geological record is a testimony to their common diagenetic history. Studies of active hydrothermal systems reported in this book describe the processes and derivatives in these environments, linking hydrocarbon generation and mineral precipitation. A comparison with residual oil in many ore bodies and mineralization occurrences in the geological record, as depicted in this book, can be explained in terms of processes in active hydrothermal systems. One of the most interesting and challenging recent discoveries, that of living nano-bacteria, is reported in this book. The `nanobes', as they have recently been dubbed, have been suggested as the link between the living and non-living matter. The resemblance of these nano-organisms to fossil forms observed in a Martian meteorite have been reported recently in the media. Likewise the similarity to nano-bacteria in Archaean sediments is highlighted in two chapters of the book. Front Matter....Pages i-x Introduction: A ‘soft-rock’ petroleum-type approach to exploration for ‘hard-rock’ minerals in sedimentary basins....Pages 1-12 Alteration and migration process of organic matter in hydrothermal systems and implications for metallogenesis....Pages 13-37 Paragenesis of gold- and hydrocarbon-bearing fluids in gold deposits....Pages 38-52 Trace elements and Sr isotopic composition of waters from the Great Artesian Basin of Australia: Implications for the formation of ore deposits and hydrocarbon resources....Pages 53-65 Nature of organic matter in the early Proterozoic, earliest life forms and metal associations....Pages 66-101 Organic and mineral matter in a Precambrian shungite deposit from Karelia, Russia....Pages 102-119 Influence of basin fill architecture on fluid flow and ore genesis in the Mount Isa Basin, Northern Australia....Pages 120-148 Metallogenesis and hydrocarbon generation in northern Mount Isa Basin, Australia: Implications for ore grade mineralization....Pages 149-184 Volcanic and post-volcanic hydrothermal activity in the Intrasudetic Basin, SW Poland; Implications for mineralization....Pages 185-202 Organic matter and metal enrichment in black shales of the Illinois Basin, USA....Pages 203-219 Organic matter from Zechstein copper deposits (Kupferschiefer) in Poland....Pages 220-242 Metalloporphyrin composition and a model for the early diagenetic mineralization of the Permian Kupferschiefer, SW Poland....Pages 243-259 The carbonate-hosted base-metal sulphide Polaris deposit in the Canadian Arctic: Organic matter alteration and clay diagenesis....Pages 260-295 Nature and source of carbonate mineralization in Bowen Basin coals, Eastern Australia....Pages 296-313 Minerals in coal....Pages 314-328 Mineralization in eastern Australia coals: a function of oil generation and primary migration....Pages 329-358 Implications of hydrocarbons in gold-bearing epithermal systems: Selected examples from the Canadian Cordillera....Pages 359-377 The association of gold—mercury mineralization and hydrocarbons in the coast ranges of northern California....Pages 378-399 Thermal history of selected sedimentary basins in an island arc: evidence from organic matter and fluid inclusions....Pages 400-420 Nannobacteria, fiction or fact?....Pages 421-444 Summary and future directions....Pages 445-446 Back Matter....Pages 447-454