Arabia is one of the most enigmatic and unknown continents on Earth. The vast Rub al-Khali desert, known as the Empty Quarter, occupying most of the landmass of Arabia was one of the last of the great continental extreme environments to be explored. Richard Burton, William Palgrave, Charles Doughty, Gertrude Bell and Freya Stark were a few of the redoubtable explorers who ventured into the vast desert wasteland of the Rub al-Khali, in what is now Saudi Arabia and the frankincense coast of Dhofar, Hadramaut and the Magreb (Yemen) in south Arabia. Although local bedouin certainly made long-distance camel treks across parts of Arabia, the first recorded north–south crossing of the Empty Quarter was achieved by Bertram Thomas in 1930–1931, described in his book ‘Arabia Felix’.

Геология протерозойских месторождений оксидов железа, Нико-кобальт-золото-висмутовых и Сью-Дайанн-медно-серебряных, южная магматическая зона Грейт-Беар, северо-западные территории, Канада.

The NICO cobalt-gold-bismuth and Sue-Dianne copper-silver deposits of the Mazenod Lake area, Northwest Territories, are currently being drill-delineated by Fortune Minerals Limited. They are the only known significant Canadian examples of the Proterozoic iron oxide-hosted polymetallic class, more commonly referred to as hydrothermal iron oxide copper-gold deposits. NICO and Sue-Dianne are located in the southern part of the Great Bear magmatic zone, the central tectonic subdivision of the Bear Structural Province. It is a post-collisional plutonic terrane with related continental volcanic rocks dating from 1867 Ma and culminating with the emplacement of A-type rapikivi granite plutons at approximately 1856 Ma. Iron oxide occurrences are widely distributed within the Great Bear magmatic zone, ranging from Salobo-type magnetite-rich schists and ironstones in receptive basement rocks to Kiruna-type magnetite-apatite-rich veins and Olympic Dam-type sulphidized magnetite-hematite breccias in overlying volcanic rocks. NICO is hosted in iron- and potassium-altered, brecciated basement sedimentary rocks at and beneath the volcanic unconformity, showing similarities to the Salobo-type. The host "black rock" amphibole-magnetite-biotite schists and ironstones are capped by potassium feldspar-magnetite "red rock" felsite. In contrast, Sue-Dianne shows the essential characteristics of Olympic Dam-type ores, with mineralization hosted within a well-zoned diatreme breccia complex crosscutting a rotated ash flow tuff succession above the unconformity. At both NICO and Sue-Dianne, ongoing detailed paragenetic studies demonstrate that early, reduced, high-temperature mineral assemblages are overprinted by late, oxidative, low-temperature assemblages. These together with stratigraphic relationships, indicate fluid mixing at shallow crustal levels was important in deposit formation. Proximity of the NICO and Sue-Dianne deposits to subvolcanic porphyries, rapakivi granite and various other phases of the Marian River Batholith, together with geochronology and mineralogy studies, suggest they are all genetically related. The occurrence of diverse iron oxide deposit types within the Great Bear magmatic zone, makes this region favourable for exploration and for the study of the Proterozoic iron oxide class as a whole.

The Tropicana-Havana gold deposit is hosted by Archaean rocks that lie along the eastern margin of the Yilgarn Craton, Western Australia. The Mineral Resource for the project is 75.3 million tonnes grading 2.07 g/t for 5.01 Moz of gold. Gold mineralisation postdates peak granulite-facies metamorphism and formed from variably oxidised, higher temperature (>350˚C), silica-undersaturated fluids.

A review of exploration expenditure by exploration stage over 15 years at Laverton Western Australia has identified a poor conversion rate from the first stage (ground acquisition) to the second stage (drill testing). This poor conversion rate is primarily due to poor target selection. The use of a well described ore deposit model and regional geological and regional geophysical datasets is able to improve target selection. The Thermal Aureole Gold ore deposit model and the relevant geological features that can be detected in regional geological maps are described and some examples are shown for Morila, Sadiola and Muruntau gold deposits. <...>