Monday 5 July 2021

Researchers discover why gold is concentrated alongside arsenic

Why are gold deposits found at all? Gold is famously unreactive, and there seems to be little reason why gold should be concentrated, rather than uniformly scattered throughout the Earth's crust. Now, an international group of geochemists have discovered why gold is concentrated alongside arsenic, explaining the formation of most gold deposits. This may also explain why many gold miners and others have been at risk from arsenic poisoning. This work is presented at the Goldschmidt conference, after recent publication.