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Russian Geology and Geophysics

2011 year, number 11

THE PHASE COMPOSITION OF CRYSTAL-FLUID NanoINCLUSIONS IN ALLUVIAL DIAMONDS IN THE NORTHEASTERN SIBERIAN PLATFORM

A.M. Logvinovaa, R. Wirthb, A.A. Tomilenkoa, V.P. Afanas'eva, and N.V. Soboleva
aV.S. Sobolev Institute of Geology and Mineralogy, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, pr. Akademika Koptyuga 3, Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia
bGFZ, German Research Centre for Geosciences, Chemistry and Physics of Earth Materials, Telegrafenberg, C-120, D-14473 Potsdam, Germany
Keywords: Diamond, nanoinclusions, fluid, carbonates, spinel, clinohumites, subduction
Pages: 1286-1297

Abstract

The phase composition of crystal-fluid nanoinclusions in two types of placer diamonds of unknown genesis from the northeastern Siberian Platform (Ebelyakh diamondiferous region) has been first studied by transmission electron microscopy including electron diffraction, analytical electron microscopy (AEM), electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS), and chromatography. The type I diamonds are transparent dodecahedroids, and the type II ones, widespread in this region, are dark rounded crystals assigned to variety V according to Orlov's mineralogical classification. Isotopic and IR-Fourie spectroscopic studies showed that the type II diamonds have a strongly light carbon isotope composition (δ13Cav = -22.4 ‰) and high concentrations of nitrogen admixture (1100-1800 ppm). Nitrogen is present mainly as an aggregate. It is shown that all inclusions no larger than 400 nm are polyphase particles consisting of solid (silicate, oxide, carbonate, salt) and fluid phases. The type I diamonds bear high-Mg carbonatite inclusions (up to 100 nm) consisting of magnesite, dolomite, Fe-spinel, and clinohumite. The fluid phase has high concentrations of K, Cl, and O. The inclusions are similar in composition to the near-solidus melts of saturated carbonatized peridotites; thus, they might have resulted either from the crystallization of the parental melt or from the quenching and crystallization of deep-seated carbonate-silicate melt. The type II diamonds bear low-Mg carbonatite polyphase nanoinclusions consisting of Ba-, Sr-, and Ca,Fe-carbonatites, K,Ba-phosphates, Ti,Si- and Ti,Al-phases, and abundant fluid segregations filled mainly with CO2, N, and hydrocarbons. These melts/solutions might have been supplied from subducted rocks of the oceanic and, partly, continental Earth's crust. The enrichment of these inclusions in incompatible elements might evidence the percolation of salt fluids enriched in Ba, Sr, P, Ti, K, and Cl through carbonatized eclogites.