Composition, mineral assemblages, and genesis of titanite and malayaite in skarns

Abstract

The composition of minerals of the titanite-malayaite series and their mineral assemblages and genesis were examined at the Bol’shoi Kan’on deposit in Magadan oblast and at other deposits. These minerals were demonstrated to be typomorphic Sn-bearing silicates in postmagmatic bimetasomatic hypabyssal calc skarns and skarnoids in tin-bearing provinces. The series of these minerals with similar crystal structures has a miscibility gap, and the minerals are characterized by notably different Sn concentrations. Moreover, titanite may contain Al, Fe, F, and OH, whose concentrations decrease in the Sn-bearing members of the series (malayaite). These silicates were formed at many deposits after the successive transforms of skarn mineral assemblages. The early assemblages include wollastonite in calcic carbonate rocks and diopside and salite in skarnoids. The latter minerals are replaced first by hedenbergite with subordinate amounts of vesuvianite and garnet first of grossular and then andradite composition. This process was syngenetic with the formation of borosilicates (danburite, axinite, and tourmaline). Ti thereby may be accommodated in grossular and Sn in Fe-bearing silicates, mostly, in andradite. Skarns often contain both titanite and malayaite, which were produced in these rocks earlier than cassiterite. The isomorphic series of these minerals has a miscibility gap. The oreforming processes ended with the crystallization of quartz, fluorite, and rare sulfides, including stannite. The late Sn-bearing minerals at some deposits are stokesite and Mg, Fe, and Ca stannates, which crystallized during malayaite replacement by newly formed calcite-quartz aggregates. The Sn-bearing sulfides are replaced by varlamoffite during supergene processes.