Petrography and geochemistry of carbonate hosted-rock in the Karavangah and Dehno Pb-Zn mines at the north of Kuhbanan, Kerman

The hosted-rocks of the Pb-Zn ore deposits in two mines of Karavangah and Dehno (north of Kuhbanan) contain carbonate rocks of the Shotori Formation (Middle Triassic).The identified carbonate facies consists of limestone and dolomite, but ore bodies mainly occurred in dolomite facies. Petrographic studies show that the dolomites can be divided into four classes including fine crystalline, medium crystalline, coarse crystalline and saddle dolomites. Geochemical data (major and trace elements) of dolomites have almost similar characteristics and show a noticeable enrichment of lead and zinc. Also, significant enrichment and similar trend are observed in the REE of hosted-rock samples. Therefore, due to similarity between geochemical characteristics of the hosted-rocks, it seems that magnesium source for dolomitization was mainly seawater, but the influence of ore fluids is significant on the formation of coarse crystalline dolomites.