Geochemistry and origin of Dehoo manganese deposit, south Zahedan, southeastern Iran

Abstract

Dehoo manganese deposit is located 52 km to the south of Zahedan in Sistan and Baluchestan Province, southeastern Iran. This deposit that lies in the central part of the Iranian Flysch Zone is lenticular in shape and lies above the micritic limestone-radiolarite cherts of the upper Cretaceous ophiolite unit. It is hosted within the reddish to brown radiolarite cherts and in places interlinks with them, so that the radiolarite chert packages play a key role for Mn mineralization in the region. Investigated ore-paragenetic successions and the geochemical characteristics of the Dehoo deposit were studied by means of major oxide, trace, and rare earth element (REE) contents that provide information as to the mineral origin. Strong positive correlations were found between major oxides and trace elements (Al2O3-TiO2, r = 0.95; TiO2-MgO, r = 0.94; Fe2O3-Al2O3, r = 0.90; MgO-Al2O3, r = 0.84; MgO-Fe2O3, r = 0.88; Fe2O3-TiO2, r = 0.91; Fe2O3-K2O, r = 0.74; Al2O3-K2O, r = 0.69; Al2O3-V, r = 0.72; TiO2-V, r = 0.73, and MgO-V, r = 0.69) that testify to the contribution of mafic terrigenous detrital material to the deposit. Chondrite-normalized REE patterns of all ore samples are characterized by negative Ce (0.06–0.15, average 0.10) and slightly positive Eu (0.29–0.45, average 0.36) anomalies. Based on ratios of Mn/Fe (average 56.23), Co/Ni (average 0.33), Co/Zn (average 0.38), U/Th (average 3.40), La/Ce (average 1.45), Lan/Ndn (average 2.16), Dyn/Ybn (average 0.33), and light REE/heavy REE (average 8.40; LREE > HREE), as well as Ba (average 920 ppm) and total REE contents (average 6.96 ppm) negative Ce and positive Eu anomalies, Dehoo could be considered a predominantly submarine hydrothermal Mn deposit complemented by terrigenous detrital mafic material.