THE 40Ar/39Ar AGE OF THE EPITHERMAL GOLD-SILVER MINERALIZATION OF ASACHINSKOE DEPOSIT, SOUTHERN KAMCHATKA

Abstract

New data on the age of epithermal gold-silver mineralization of Asachinskoe Deposit (southern Kamchatka) are obtained by the 40Ar/39Ar method of stage heating involving preirradiation of samples for 48 hours by fast neutron currents in a cadmium-plated reactor channel. Correlation with the earlier data on integral K/Ar dating and a laser variant of the 40Ar/39Ar method has been carried out. According to the structural orderliness revealed by high resolution X-ray analysis and infrared spectroscopy, potassic feldspars found in veins have been identified as a continuous series: maximum microcline → intermediate microcline → intermediate orthoclase → extreme orthoclase. The age of quartz-orthoclase vein 1 is 3.2 ± 0.2 Ma (the Piacenzian). A younger age, about 1.1 ± 0.3 Ma (the Early Pleistocene) is determined for a quartz-microcline vein with post-mineralization brecciation and recrystallization related to the basalt dike magmatism of this age.