Geochemistry of Ore Fluids and Rb-Sr Isotopic Dating for the Wulong Gold Deposit in Liaoning, China

Abstract On the basis of detailed geological studies of the Wulong gold deposit, three metallogenic stages can be identified. With quartz fluid inclusions as an object of study, the authors investigated phase characteristics, compositional variations, temperature and pressure changes, fluid evolution, Pb isotope tracing and Rb‐Sr isotopic dating of fluid inclusions entrapped in the above three metallogenic stages. The results show that Na⁺ is decreased obviously with metallogenic evolution, while K⁺ and other cations and gas compositions (H₂, CO, CH₄ and CO₂) are increased slightly, and that the temperature and salinity vary in a pulsating manner along with the metallogenic evolution. Inverse calculation of hydrogen and oxygen isotopes indicate that at the first metallogenic stage the fluids were magmatic water, at the second stage they were dominated by magmatic water with a minor amount of meteoric water involved, and at the third stage, i.e., the final stage of metallogenesis, the fluids were composed completely of meteoric water. Its Pb isotopic composition implicates that the ore lead has some affinities with the lead in the Sanguliu granite, but the linear array of the ore‐lead isotopic data reflects a mixing source of two end members. It can be deduced that the ore‐forming materials and magma were both derived mainly from the same magma source region at depths. The Rb‐Sr isotopic ages of the fluid inclusions are 112.2±3.2 Ma, indicating that the Wulong gold deposit was formed during the Yanshanian period.