Boudinage; a key to an organizing principle for the formation of ore deposits

Abstract

A number of ore deposits are juxtaposed to illustrate a common boudinage signature. Examples are (1) Kalgoorlie (an epigenetic vein-type gold deposit from the Eastern gold fields of Western Australia; (2) Broken Hill (a stratiform sediment-hosted lead-zinc-silver deposit from New South Wales, Australia); (3) three hematite enrichment iron ore deposits, one from the Hamersley region of Western Australia, one from the Krivoi Rog region of Ukraine, and one from Nimba Range, Liberia; (4) Kambalda (an Archcan stratiform and strata-bound ultramafic-hosted nickel deposit in the Eastern Goldfields of Western Australia, with the same tectonic environment as Kalgoorlie); (5) the diamondiferous Argyle kimberlite pipe in the Kimberley region of Western Australia; and (6) typical oil and gas plays of western Europe. The first four of these deposits are the type, or close to the type for their class, emphasizing the importance of the linkage. A further boudinage emphasis lies in the historical perspective for these first enumerated deposits, for which a boudinage control was either explicitly or implicitly described by others. It is concluded that an important organizing principal in ore emplacement is probably being addressed, one which operates regardless of mineralization type or crustal level (tectonic environment), which remains unrecognized in the popular consensus on ore controls, which could usefully be a framework for other popular consensual models, and which could substantially advance understanding of controls on emplacement of mineralization and related tectonics generally.