A number of lead-zinc deposits occur in the southeastern Canadian Rocky Mountains in the Banff-Lake Louise, Alberta, and Field, British Columbia areas, and in the Liard Basin of western Canada. The deposits occur in Cambro-Ordovician strata in the mountains and Devonian strata in the Liard Basin. The deposits occur in carbonate or argillaceous rocks, and have been classified as Mississippi Valley-Type low-temperature deposits.

Twenty representative sphalerites were analyzed by X-ray fluorescence techniques for iron, cadmium, manganese and selenium and 12 galenas were analyzed for selenium. Cell edge measurements were made on 15 sphalerites and these compared to the cell edge calculated from the amount of iron, cadmium and manganese in each sphalerite. The chemical analyses and cell edge determinations yielded results similar to other published values for similar sphalerites.

The sulfur isotope ratios of 31 sulfide minerals (sphalerite, galena, chalcopyrite and pyrite) were determined by mass spectrometric analysis. All the samples were found to be enriched in the heavier isotope (S³⁴, and the S³⁴ values ranges from +8.1 to +31.3 mils. The writer believes the sulfur originated from the source rocks by some biogenic or other process. Since there is no obvious igneous source, the writer believes that the metals came in with hydrothermal solutions mobilized by a heat source of unknown origin. These solutions were probably connate waters or a mixture of connate and dilute magmatic waters.

End_of_Record - Last_Page 208-------