Indium Enrichment in the Meng'entaolegai Ag-Pb-Zn Deposit, Inner Mongolia, China

Abstract. The Meng'entaolegai In-rich Ag-Pb-Zn deposit is located in the eastern part of Inner Mongolia. It is one of the In-richest deposits in China. Large amounts of quartz and sulfide minerals constitute a hydrothermal quartz-sulfide vein deposit within a Hercynian acidic granite massif, which occupies an area of about 400 km2. Thirty-six orebodies, controlled strictly by the E-W trend faults, are found in the orefield of 6 km in length from east to west and 200 to 1,000 m in width from south to north. The ore minerals are mainly galena, sphalerite and pyrite, and subordinate chalcopyrite, arsenopyrite, cassiterite and stannite with many Ag-minerals. The gangue minerals are mainly quartz, calcite, sericite and chlorite. Economic components of the deposit are dominated by Pb andZn (reserves of Pb and Zn are 0.17 Mt and 0.37 Mt, and their grades are 1 % and 2.3 %, respectively), with Ag, Sn, In and Cd (1,800 t Ag, >2,000 t Sn, >500 t In and 1,800 t Cd) as by-products. Indium is highly enriched in ores and its contents are 9 to 295 ppm in ores and 85 to 2,660 ppm in sphalerite. Analytical results show that the ore-forming fluid of this deposit contains 0.8–3.5 ppm In and 4–36 ppm Sn, and the two elements show a very good positive correlation with a correlation coefficient of 0.8672, while the correlation between In and Zn in the ore-forming fluids, with a correlation coefficient of 0.5723, is not as good as that between In and Sn. This indicates that indium has an affinity with tin in the ore-forming fluids. The authors think that this is probably the main reason why those In-rich deposits spread over the world are simultaneously enriched in tin.