Talc indices from Boumnyebel (Central Cameroon), physico-chemical characteristics and geochemistry

Abstract

Two talc schist occurrences were discovered in the Boumnyebel area, embedded in the Pan-African mica schist, at the junction between Archean, Eburnean and Neoproterozoic formations in Cameroon. They have been analysed by different techniques such as chemical analyses, XRD, DRIFTS, DTA and TG. The talc schist of the northern deposit contains talc (up to 95 wt%) with chlorite, goethite and lepidocrocite as minor minerals. The talc schist of the southern deposit has up to 88% of talc and is speckled with dark green phenoblasts of amphiboles (coexisting prismatic tremolite and magnesio-riebeckite). Due to its high talc content, the amphibole-free talc schist is economically attractive. Chemical analyses show that most of the rocks consist of SiO 2, MgO and Fe 2O 3, except the sample from the southern deposit that displays some amounts of Al 2O 3 and CaO. Among trace elements, Ni, Co and Cr are as high as in serpentinized peridotites, and suggest a protolith of ultrabasic nature. Chromium concentration in tremolite reaches 6178 ppm; most of the trace elements (Cd, Cr, Dy, Er, Eu, Ga, Gd, Ho, Lu, Nd, Pr, Sm, Sn, Sr, Tb, Tm, Y, Yb, Zr) are compatible with a tremolite lattice. The regional metamorphism yielded garnet micaschist nappes and thus belongs to the upper greenschist facies. Based on the high talc contents of the rocks and occasional coexisting tremolite and magnesio-riebeckite, the origin of the talc deposits is assigned to a hydrothermal alteration of ultramafic rocks. During the hydrothermal event, the fluid composition changed from silica-rich to lime-rich, but very few trace element contents were affected. Thus the low Rb, Sr, Th, Nb, K, Ta, Y, Zr, Hf, MREE and HREE and high Ni, Cr, Co contents of the rocks point to depleted peridotites (harzburgite–lherzolite) and pyroxenite as protoliths. The hydrothermal alteration is expressed in the positive cerium anomaly accompanied by little LREE enrichment of talc-rich rocks and hornblendite. The studied talc schist deposits and the neighbouring gabbroic and ultramafic rocks may belong to a dismembered Pan-African ophiolite set.