On May 3, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported that an international team of scientists has discovered a gold deposit in northern China.
While gold deposits typically form billions of years ago, this massive gold deposit in northern China was formed approximately 120 to 140 million years ago. Notably, it was created by magma fluids mixing with rainwater, a process distinct from gold found in other parts of the world.
This gold deposit in China formed approximately 120-140 million years ago. (Illustration: Shutterstock).
The international team of scientists stated that their discovery could aid in locating gold resources by identifying areas with magma activity. The study on the “peculiar” gold deposit in northern China was published on May 3, detailing the geological processes they uncovered.
“Magma fluids are sourced from a chamber beneath. Fault activity and fractures facilitate the upward movement of magma fluids, which then mix with rainwater, leading to gold deposition”, the study noted.
The international team includes researchers from the China University of Geosciences, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the University of Wisconsin-Madison (USA), and the German Geological Research Center.
The majority of northern China – including present-day Beijing, Tianjin, and Hebei – is situated on a part of the lithosphere known as the craton (a stable and ancient part of the continental crust that has existed through multiple continental mergers and separations for at least 500 million years).
One of the authors of the study, Professor Li Jianwei from the China University of Geosciences, noted that although the source of fluids and the process of gold formation in this northern Chinese gold deposit differ from other cratons worldwide, their metallic composition is largely similar.
The international team employed ion analysis techniques and found that this gold deposit appears to originate from the degassing of a magma chamber below.
