Sedimentogenic Mineral Deposit

Sedimentogenic Mineral Deposit 

a surface, supergene, or exogenic useful mineral deposit, the formation conditions of which are related to processes that occurred in the past and that are currently developing on the surface and in the near-surface zone of the earth. Sedimentogenic deposits are formed as a result of the chemical, biochemical, and mechanical differentiation of mineral substances, which is related to exogenic processes, as well as a result of the concentration of a mineral substance during the formation of sediments. Massifs and rocks and mineral veins that have formed underground and been brought to the surface of the earth can be the primary source of sedimentogenic deposits. Another source is underwater and littoral volcanism.

Weathering deposits may arise with a change in previously formed complexes of rocks and plutonic deposits occurring in the zone of oxidation. With physical weathering and the related mechanical decomposition of the rock bodies, which include strong and chemically resistant valuable minerals, placer deposits (seePLACER) are formed. With chemical, biochemical, mechanical, and volcanic differentiation of a mineral substance in the process of the accumulation of series of sedimentary rocks, sedimentary mineral deposits are formed.

REFERENCE

Smirnov, V. I. Geologiia poleznykh iskopaemykh, 2nd ed. Moscow, 1969.