Comparative elemental and oxygen isotope geochemistry of jasperoid in the northern great basin: evidence for distinctive fluide evolution in gold-producting hydrothermal system - a discussion / Сравнительная элементная и кислородно-изотопная геохимия яшмы

Discriminating productive jasperoids associated with economic gold mineralization from barren jasperoids, those with no known gold association, has long been an objective of Great Basin explorationists. Holland et al. (1988) use factor analysis of a multielement geochemical data set to compare jasperoids associated with Carlin-type gold mineralization with jasperoids in barren systems. They go on to propose a genetic model for Carlin-type deposits based on their interpretation of the factor analysis results. There are problems with their approach, several of which the authors acknowledge. The geologic control for their samples is inadequate, the analytical technique used is inaccurate for several critical elements, and their statistical analysis of the data could be much simpler, easier to interpret, and useful.