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Geological context, mineralization, and timing of the Juramento sediment-hosted stratiform copper–silver deposit, Salta district, northwestern Argentina

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Abstract

The Juramento deposit in northwestern Argentina exhibits several readily visible general characteristics of sediment-hosted stratiform copper (SSC) mineralization. It consists of fine-grained disseminated base-metal sulfides within marine to lacustrine graybeds (the basal whitish Late Cretaceous Lecho Sandstone and shallow-water carbonates of the overlying Maastrichtian Yacoraite Formation) that overlie a thick sequence of redbeds (the Pirgua Subgroup). The property has been examined and drilled in three successive exploration programs as a possible analog of world-class mineralization in the copperbelts of central Africa and the Kupferschiefer. The present report provides specific field and laboratory results that confirm the classification as SSC-type mineralization. The host graybeds are the basal sandstone and overlying oolitic and stromatolitic units of the Yacoraite Formation, which are shown from textural studies to be carbonaceous and to have initially contained very fine-grained, disseminated, syndiagenetic pyrite. These sediments would have been sufficiently porous and permeable in early diagenetic time to allow an infiltration of metalliferous fluids from the underlying redbeds, resulting in the observed progressive replacement of in situ pyrite by common base-metal sulfides (sphalerite, galena, argentiferous tetrahedrite, and copper-rich sulfides: first chalcopyrite, then bornite, and finally chalcocite). Sulfur isotope analyses indicate that a portion of the sulfur of ore-stage sulfides is isotopically heavier than that of pyrite, possibly due to a contribution from associated gypsum. Ore-stage sulfides are zoned vertically and obliquely through the mineralized zones, from cupriferous sulfides at low stratigraphic levels to lead- and zinc-rich mineralization above, with unreplaced pyrite remaining within upper Yacoraite strata. The zoned sulfides and their replacement textures, the peneconformable configuration of the mineralized zones, and the position of ore-stage mineralization adjacent to a stratigraphically defined redox transition from redbeds upward into graybeds indicate an overprint of copper (and accompanying ore-stage metals) on originally pyritic graybeds. The influx of ore-stage metals, presumably in an oxidized low-temperature brine, terminated with a silicification event that effectively sealed the host carbonates. These observations and the overall genetic interpretation are consistent with the general deposit-scale genetic model for early diagenetic SSC mineralization. The regional geologic context is also consistent with its classification as a SSC deposit: It is hosted by post-oxyatmoversion sediments and was formed in association with evaporites at a low paleolatitude in a major intracontinental rift system.

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Acknowledgment

We are especially appreciative for the invitation from Ian Mason to undertake this study and for his insightful introduction to the field area and for the important support of Joe Rotzien and his most enthusiastic and helpful geos during the fieldwork. We also wish to acknowledge Professors Mountjoy and Williams-Jones of McGill University who provided invaluable advice and access to their research facilities. We also thank Paramount Ventures and Finances for the field employment of the first author and for partial funding of research costs. The study was also sponsored in part by a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Individual Grant to the second author.

We wish, as well, to thank Alexandre Cabral, Rod Kirkham, and Steven Roberts for the many helpful suggestions provided in their careful reviews of the manuscript, and Bernd Lehmann for his excellent editorial comments.

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  1. C. Gustavo Durieux

    Present address: Anglo American Exploration (Canada) Ltd., Suite 800-700 West Pender St., Vancouver, British Columbia, V6C 1G8, Canada

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  1. Department of Civil, Geological and Mining Engineering, École Polytechnique de Montréal, P.O. Box 6079, Station Centre-Ville, Montreal, Quebec, H3C 3A7, Canada

    C. Gustavo Durieux & Alex C. Brown

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  1. C. Gustavo Durieux
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Correspondence to C. Gustavo Durieux.

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Durieux, C.G., Brown, A.C. Geological context, mineralization, and timing of the Juramento sediment-hosted stratiform copper–silver deposit, Salta district, northwestern Argentina. Miner Deposita 42, 879–899 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00126-007-0138-2

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