An Issue Devoted to Magmatic Sulfide Mineralization and Ore Deposits with Special Emphasis on China: Preface

Abstract

The 12th International Ni-Cu-(PGE) Symposium held in Guiyang in June 2012 brought together most of the world’s leading authorities on magmatic sulfide deposits and covered a wide range of topics and deposits. Not surprisingly, a high proportion of the papers presented at the Symposium dealt with Ni-Cu-PGE sulfide deposits in China, several of which have received limited coverage to date in the Western literature. This special issue brings together a number of important new advances on Ni-Cu-PGE deposits in the Central Asian orogenic belt, including the Huangshandong, Hongqiling, Poyi, and Erbutu deposits in China. Other specific studies on Chinese deposits cover the well-known Jinchuan deposit, and the mineralization associated with the Zhubu intrusion in the Emeishan large igneous province. An account of the komatiite-related Spotted Quoll deposit in Western Australia, and a description of newly discovered deep-seated ultramafic cumulates in the Bushveld Complex complete the collection of locality-based papers. The remainder of the issue is taken up with more generic papers covering aspects of magmatic sulfide formation at different scales: geochemical modeling of S solubility in mafic magmas and Fe-Ni partitioning between olivine and sulfide liquid; the role (or lack of it) of subcontinental lithospheric mantle in ore formation; and an account of new methodologies for three-dimensional characterization of textures in magmatic sulfide ores. The volume opens with a paper on the sulfide geochemistry of the Jinchuan deposit, the largest Ni-Cu-PGE in China and the third largest in the world. Chen et al. (2013) discuss wide variations in sulfide tenors (i.e., the metal content of the sulfide component of the rock) in the western part of the Jinchuan intrusion. They attribute variations in total PGE contents and Cu/PGE ratios to a combination of factors: variable degrees of pre-emplacement PGE depletion of the parental magmas and in situ differentiation of …