Abstract
There has been a noticeable evolution within the last ten years in the geochemical prospecting methods, particularly with increased use of emission spectrometry; several factors favoured this evolution: In France as well as in many countries, large geochemical surveys are carried out in order to promote exploration and/or draw up an inventory of the potential mining resources of the country; such an exhaustive inventory requires the analysis of a great number of elements, and leads to the use of emission spectrometry. Geochemistry gradually proves itself as one of the most efficient tools in exploration (even the most efficient in some cases), if used with a relatively high sample density, in order to locate directly the deposits sought; the preliminary selection of favourable areas through low samples density reconnaissance surveys seems a hazardous and hardly efficient procedure. Fortunately the utilization of the computer, which geologists have become more familiar with, allows to make better interpretation: the computer makes it possible to overcome the difficulties which inevitably would have occurred in the processing of large amounts of analytical data. An important technical effort has been made to provide sufficiently accurate analyses for use in geochemical prospecting, at as low a cost as possible. The obtained data have caused a reconsideration of the usual models of secondary dispersion around ore deposits; in France and in the regions with similar climate (and paleoclimate) there is mainly a mechanical migration from weathered rocks, related to former permafrost phenomena in a tundra-type environment. The old idea of the metal fixation on clays and organic compounds must, in most cases, be given up, at least with regard to soil or stream sediment anomalies related to ore deposits.
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