Mineralization time, space, geodynamic background and metallogenic model of the Skarn gold deposits, China

Skarn type is one of the major types of the gold deposits of China, with at least 14 large and 28 medium deposits discovered. The total skarn type reservoir is more than 700 tons which accounting for more than 15% in the total gold reservoir of China. The mineralizing time of skarn gold deposits is mainly of late Mesozoic (Yanshanian), contemporaneous with the collision orogenesis occurred in the mainland of China; the gold orebodies emplaced in the late stage of the collision orogenesis. Almost all the skarn gold deposits distributed in the collision orogenic belts, fault-magmatic belts and marginal mobile belts, especially in the Lower Yangtze River district. Their metallogenic geodynamic background was the compression-extension transition stage of collision orogenesis. The geological and the geochemical characteristics of the skarn gold deposits and their related igneous intrusions are exclusively coincident with the metallogenic model for collision orogenesis or for A-type subduction. It shows that the metallogenic model for collision orogenesis is the oreforming models for the most of the skarn gold deposits, China.EI04456-4663