Corundum inclusions in diamonds—discriminatory criteria and a corundum compositional dataset

Mineral inclusions of corundum are reported from diamonds from alluvial deposits of tributaries of the Rio Aripuanã, Juina, Brazil. We present the first recorded occurrence of sapphire as an inclusion in diamond and expand on the database of ruby and white corundum inclusions. Ruby inclusions are found to occur both as isolated and touching grains with aluminous pyroxene and associated with ferropericlase. Mineral chemistry and phase relations place the origin of such ruby-bearing diamonds within the lower mantle at 770 km. Mineral associations indaving other corundum inclusions were not observed; hence, their depth of origin is less certain.

Compositions of corundum samples were characterised by electron and ion microprobe. Given the scarcity of literature data, corundum samples from a variety of other geological settings were also analysed. Samples comprised corundums associated with granitic emplacement, metasomatism, amphibolite-facies and granulite-facies rocks, gem and industrial synthetic origins and carmine-coloured corundums recovered from kimberlite drill cores.

In addition to variable amounts of Cr, Fe, Ti, Mg and Si, measurable quantities of other transition elements and high field strength elements were also detected. Corundums from similar geological settings show very similar compositions and are easily distinguishable from other settings. Irrespective of locality, rubies from Norwegian, Tanzanian and Kenyan amphibolite-facies rocks are compositionally indistinguishable. Additionally, corundums from metasomatised zones associated with contact metamorphism from Arizona and Japan were very similar, particularly characterised by unusually high abundance of mobile Zr and Nb (tens of ppm). All Juina inclusions are particularly distinguishable from other corundums by high concentrations of Ni (18–171 ppm weight), typically at least an order of magnitude enriched over the same corundum varietal types from elsewhere. Furthermore, the sapphire inclusion exhibited much larger ratios of Ga and Ge to HFSE elements compared to otherwise similar samples, and ruby inclusions are distinguished by high Mg/Fe ratios (0.27–1.56 by weight). Compositional differences between inclusions in diamonds and corundums from other settings in addition to corundum's physical and chemical durability suggest that with the employment of rapid identification tools such as energy dispersive spectrometry (EDS) and laser-ICPMS, corundum has promise as an indicator of diamond prospectivity.