Coexistence of a Fluid Phase with Granitic Magma: Geochemical Characteristics of REE and Cu in Miyako Granite and in Scheelite‐bearing Aplitic Veins at the Yamaguchi Cu‐W Skarn Deposit, Iwate, Japan
Authors: OGATA Takeyuki , ISHIYAMA Daizo , MIZUTA Toshio , NAKASHIMA Kazuo 
Published: November 2008

Abstract: The North granitic body of the Miyako pluton is located in the Northern Kitakami belt, Northeast Japan. The formation of the scheelite–chalcopyrite–magnetite–bearing aplitic veins and scheelite–chalcopyrite–magnetite–bearing Yamaguchi skarn deposit was closely associated with the formation of the Miyako plutons. Petrographic facies of the North granitic body vary from quartz diorite in marginal zone (zone A), to tonalite and granodiorite (zone B), and to granite (zone C) in the central. The large numbers of aplitic veins distributed around the Yamaguchi mining area are divided into two groups: barren and scheelite–mag–netite–chalcopyrite–bearing aplitic veins. The latter cut massive clinopyroxene skarns of the Yamaguchi deposit, and are composed of plagioclase, K‐feldspar and titanite. Some plagioclase crystals have dusty cores with irregularly shaped K‐feldspar flakes, and clear rims of albite. Textures of plagioclase in the mineralized aplitic veins are different from the idiomorphic textures with sharp plagioclase crystal boundaries that occur in the North granitic body and barren aplitic veins. These textural data suggest that the mineralized aplitic veins were formed from hydrothermal fluid.

Changes in the contents of major and minor (Rb, Sr, Sc, Co, Th, U) elements in the North Miyako granitic body are similar to those of zoned plutons formed by typical magmatic differentiation processes. On the other hand, concentrations of REE, especially middle to heavy REE, of granitic rocks in zone C and barren aplitic veins are significantly lower than those of granitic rocks in zones A and B. The hypothetical chondrite‐normalized REE patterns, calculated assuming fractional crystallization from zone B granitic melt, suggest that REE concentrations of the residual melt increased with the degree of fractional crystallization, and changed into a pattern with enriched LREE and strongly negative Eu anomaly. However, the REE patterns of granitic rocks in zone C are different from the hypothetical patterns. Moreover, the REE patterns of magnetite–scheelite–chalcopyrite aplitic veins are quite different from those of granitic rocks. The Cu contents of granitic rocks in the North Miyako body increase from zone A (5–26 ppm) to zone B (10–26 ppm), and then clearly decrease to zone C (5–7 ppm) and drastically increase to the barren aplitic veins (39–235 ppm). Concentrations of Cu in the mineralized aplitic veins are also higher than those of the granitic rocks in zone C.

The decrease in REE and Cu contents of granitic rocks from zone B to zone C is not a result of simple magmatic fractional differentiation. Fluid inclusions in quartz from mineralized aplitic veins contain 3.3 wt% NaCl equivalent and 5.8 wt% CO2. It was also demonstrated experimentally that the removal of MREE and HREE by fluid from melt enabled the formation of complexes of REE and ligands of OH‐ and CO32‐. Based on the possibility that the melt of the granitic rocks of zone C and the mineralized aplitic veins coexisted with CO2‐bearing fluid, it is thought that REE were extracted from the melt to the CO2‐bearing fluid, and that the REE in the mineralized aplitic veins were transported by the CO2‐bearing fluid. It is likely that the low HREE and Cu contents of the granitic rocks in zone C could have been caused by the removal of those elements from the granitic melt by the fluid coexisting with the melt. The expelled materials could have been the sources of scheelite–magnetite–chalcopyrite–bearing aplitic veins and copper mineralization of the Yamaguchi Cu‐W skarn deposit.