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Rare earth and uranium minerals present as daughter crystals in fluid inclusions, Mary Kathleen U-REE skarn, Queensland, Australia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 July 2018

T. A. P. Kwak  and
P. B. Abeysinghe
T. A. P. Kwak
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, La Trobe University, Bundoora, Victoria 3083, Australia
P. B. Abeysinghe
Affiliation:
Geological Survey Department, Colombo 2, Sri Lanka
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Abstract

At least six separate rare earth and uranium-bearing daughter crystals occur in fluid inclusions hosted by andraditic garnet from the Mary Kathleen REE-U ore skarn, Queensland, Australia. The daughter minerals are particularly high in La, Nd and Ce which reflects the relatively high concentration of these in the bulk ore (La2O3 = 33.5%, Nd2O3 = 9.1% and Ce2O2 = 51.5% of the 2.6 wt. % REE common in the ore). The host garnets themselves contain up to 7600 ppm REE and 5 to 2700 ppm U. The energy-dispersive spectra (EDS) are consistent with the following minerals: a (Y, Ce, U, Ca, Fe, Nb, Ta) mineral; a (Ca, Fe, Ce) carbonate(?) mineral; a (Fe, Ca, Y, Ce, Nb, Ta) mineral; a possible carbonate of La, Mn and Nd; a chlorite of Mn and La as well as a possible chloride or oxychloride of K, Mg, Mn and La. Their occurrence infers that relatively high concentrations of REE and U prevailed in the original, oxidized, concentrated (30–70 wt. % total dissolved salts), high-temperature (550–670°) ore solutions. Their presence as daughter crystals may be due to the fact that CaCl2 is a dominant salt in the solutions and that the latter's solubility was sufficiently high to ‘salt out’ the less soluble REE-U components.

Keywords

fluid inclusionsrare earth mineralsuraniumskarnQueenslandAustralia
Type
Mineralogy
Information
Mineralogical Magazine , Volume 51 , Issue 363 , December 1987 , pp. 665 - 670
Copyright
Copyright © The Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland 1987

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