Experiments using artificial and seawater brines indicate that halite and sylvite can be precipitated by mixing brines of differing stages of evaporation, in addition to the previously recognized mechanisms of direct evaporative crystallization and crystallization by temperature changes. A modification of present geologic models is proposed to show how brine mixing might work in an evaporite basin. Conclusions based on the experiments and their relations to the geologic model are as follows. (1) Salt can precipitate in a marine evaporite basin by mixing brines of different composition and specific gravity. (2) Precipitation may occur without further water loss by evaporation. (3) Precipitation can take place from brines that were undersaturated before mixing. (4) deposited in the deepest parts of a basin, although nearly all parts of the basin could receive such deposits. (5) Sylvite could be precipitated as a primary mineral. (6) Hopper crystals (cubic and tabular) con form as a result of brine mixing in water of any depth.
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Omer B. Raup (1970) studied this question.