Porphyry Copper-Gold and Epithermal Gold-Silver Systems

Research associate Dr. Crystal LaFlamme and PhD candidate Stefano Caruso were joined by Adjunct Professor and CET board member Dr. Jon Hronsky from Western Mining Services and featured in an ABC news clipping and article entitled: Sulfur could hold key to next generation of mining deposits, research says. At the Centre for Exploration Targeting at the University of Western Australia we work as a team in collaboration with students and colleagues from CSIRO, GSWA and Curtin University to incorporate geophysical and geochemical techniques to better target mineral systems that are often not exposed at the surface. Within the framework of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Core to Crust Fluid Systems (CCFS), this project, funded by the Minerals Research Institute of Western Australia (MRIWA), is an extraordinary opportunity to take advantage of the latest advances in conceptual targeting models and technology to unlock the mineral wealth of Western Australia.

CET researchers published in Special Publication 393 from the Geological Society “Ore Deposits of a Changing Earth."

Recent CET Geoscience Honours Graduate, Matthew Kanakis, produces a landmark study which will interest both gold explorers and investors equally. The outcome, put simply shows that instead of costs falling as mine grade increased; there was no easily discernible relationship between costs and grade despite the abundance of cost and grade data in the study (which covered the information reported by companies throughout the July to September and October to December periods in 2013).

Gold price “out of the doldrums” but will an increase in royalties be beneficial? Pietro Guj (CET/UWA) and Allan Kelly (Doray Minerals) talk to Jonathan Barrett of the Financial Review with their opinions.

The CET is taking a lead role in Stage 3 of the West African Exploration Initiative, which starts this September with a kick-off sponsors meeting in Dakar, Senegal. The West African Exploration Initiative (WAXI) is an ambitious research and training program led by a consortium of partner institutions, focused on the mineral potential of the West African Craton. This initiative, which commenced in November 2006, has been principally funded by the international Mining Industry and the Australian Government (AusAID & ARC), via an AMIRA International consortium. AMIRA International is an industry association dedicated to supporting collaborative minerals industry research. Capacity building activities have led to over 35 graduate projects, half of them taken up by African students, and an average of 5 short courses per year, run exclusively in West Africa. The WAXI project has a close collaboration with the International Mining for Development Centre (www.IM4DC.org).