Paleovolcanism of the eastern Magnitogorsk megazone, Southern Urals: Petrology, geochemistry, and gold-bearing perspectives

Abstract

The geological-petrographic and petrogeochemical features of volcanic rocks are considered of the Gumbeika zone in the Southern Urals, that is the frontal easternmost portion of the East Magnitogorsk paleo-island arc. The volcanites are united into the Gumbeika volcanic association. The association is shown to be represented by the basalt– andesite–dacite–rhyodacite “uninterrupted” homodrom igneous series. The compositional features of the volcanics allow confident assigning them to the island-arc calc-alkaline series, or more precisely, to formations of “developed” island arcs. It is concluded that the main process that determines the general appearance and composition of the unified petrogenetic series of rocks of the Gumbeika association was the fractional crystallization of the parental basaltic melts in deep-seated chambers and, then, in near-surface peripheral ones. The emplacement of some of the magmatic bodies was also accompanied by in situ gravitational differentiation. The general similarity of the volcanics-associated gold-silver deposits with the analogs within recent island arcs allows us to suggest a great perspectives for gold-silver mineralization throughout the Gumbeika zone. Two forecasted ore fields have been identified.