A new kind of invisible gold in pyrite hosted in deformation-related dislocations

Abstract Mining of “invisible gold” associated with sulfides in gold ores represents a significant proportion production worldwide. Gold hosted sulfide minerals has been proposed to be structurally bound the crystal lattice as sulfide-gold alloy and/or occur discrete metallic nanoparticles. Using combination microstructural quantification and nanoscale geochemical analyses on pyrite from an orogenic deposit, we show that dislocations deformation low-angle boundary can enriched Ni, Cu, As, Pb, Sb, Bi, Au. The cumulative trace-element enrichment is 3.2 at% higher compared bulk crystal. We propose trace elements were segregated during migration dislocation following dislocation-impurity pair model. new style invisible gold.