Luminescence Applications in Ore Geology, Mining, and Industry

Luminescence applications in ore geology, mining, and beneficiation include remote prospecting, ground-based exploration, and radio metric sorting. Remote prospecting for ores with a drone or helicopter-borne luminescent sensing using laser excitation and time-delayed detection is becoming commonplace. Modern ground-based exploration increasingly utilises outlining of luminescing “fugitive calcite” veinlet halos, whose characteristics can rapidly and inexpensively give information on the overall size of a mineralised system and the principal structural controls on ore fluid migration pathways. Diamonds and scheelite have been found and recovered through X-ray luminescent radiometric sorting, while laser-induced luminescence has great potential, especially for sorting diamonds lacking X-ray luminescence, fluorite, spodumene, and rare earth element (REE)–bearing minerals. The luminescence concept is expanded here to include laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy; its fusion with X-ray techniques provides simultaneous information on both the mineralogical and chemical composition of a rock.