Recognizing Tourmaline in Mineralized Porphyry Cu Systems: Textures and Major-Element Chemistry
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Abstract Samples of tourmaline supergroup minerals from seven mineralized porphyry systems (Cu, ±Au, ±Mo), including Casino (Yukon Territory, Canada), Coxheath (Nova Scotia, Canada), Donoso breccia-Los Bronces (Chile), Highland Valley Copper (British Columbia, Canada), New Afton (British Columbia, Canada), Schaft Creek (British Columbia, Canada), and Woodjam (British Columbia, Canada), were examined at a variety of scales to evaluate their relationships with mineralization. Data from paragenetic observations show that tourmaline supergroup minerals are generally early hydrothermal minerals that predate both mineralization and alteration (e.g., overgrown and crosscut by). In general, tourmaline supergroup minerals occur as sub- to euhedral crystals that are black in hand sample and can be found in a variety of mineralized settings (including breccias, veins, and disseminations) and alteration assemblages (including potassic, sodic-calcic, phyllic, propylitic, and argillic). As tourmaline supergroup minerals are physically and chemically resilient and occur throughout a given porphyry system, they are comprehensive recorders of the type and extent of various geochemical processes that exist during the complex genesis of these systems. Data from BSE imaging shows two primary zonation types: concentric and sector. These are interpreted to reflect conditions of rapid crystallization and disequilibrium. Results from SEM-EDS analyses show that most tourmaline supergroup minerals are dravite (∼80% of grains), with the remainder being primarily classified as schorl. Porphyry tourmaline supergroup minerals exhibit remarkably consistent ∼2.0 apfu Mg values (range: 0.69–2.89), with the majority of tourmaline supergroup minerals plotting along the oxy-dravite–povondraite trend, reflecting the predominance of the Al3+ ↔ Fe3+ substitution at constant Mg values. This pattern starts from the povondraite side (reflecting the oxidizing nature of early porphyry mineralizing fluids) and trends toward oxy-dravite as a porphyry system evolves, a feature that can, in turn, be interpreted to reflect relative emplacement depths. In mineralized porphyry systems, tourmaline supergroup minerals exhibit remarkably similar physical and chemical characteristics among the systems examined, suggesting that the source and geological processes must be extraordinarily similar. Unfortunately, these characteristics are not unique to porphyry systems and such observations should be integrated with additional data, such as trace element mineral chemistry, to effectively discriminate tourmaline supergroup minerals that have formed in porphyry systems.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".