Geochemical mapping in the area of L’ubietova, Slovak Republic

L’ubietova is a village in the Banska Bystrica Region in the Slovak Republic. There is an old mining spot in its vicinity, where copper was extracted from the Bronze Age to the 19 century. Currently, the region is interesting by mineral collectors due to a p that can be found there, called libethenite. According to the literature (Kodera 1990, Duda & Paulis 2002) there are two areas of copper mineralization near L’ubietova, which differ in the occurrence of copper compounds formed with arsenic and phosphorus. The first deposit (Podlipa) is mainly known for its secondary-mineral paragenesis of copper phosphates, especially libethenite and pseudomalachite. On the second, (the Svatodusna deposit) diverse paragenesis of secondary arsenic minerals developed. The most characteristic of these arsenians are olivenite, euchroite and pharmaco siderite. Many scientific works concern the L’ubietova region (Andras et al. 2009, Rusko et al. 2009), however none of them has yet paid attention to the differentiation and the lateral distribution of copper-phosphorus and copper-arsenic mineralization and to the description of primary and secondary causes of the differentiation and the distribution. The aim of this study was to determine these phenomena and to optimise future analytical procedures, which would allow the local copper mineralization to be examined thoroughly. The project was based on the assumption that surface geochemical mapping will help to establish the range of copper mineralization in two areas distinct from each other if regard to the copper compounds. In order to draw up appropriate methodology, it was necessary to conduct research that included terrain inspection, preliminary sampling and analysis of soil specimens and dump-field material in regard to the content of copper, phosphorus and arsenic. The field study was based on extracting three soil specimens and two dump-field material samples along the profile line. Their chemical composition was later analysed by X-ray Fluorescence (XRF) and their mineral composition was determined by X-ray Diffraction (XRD). The preliminary examination confirmed the existence of lateral differentiation of copper mineralization, which was proved by establishing the differentiation of samples' content of copper, phosphorus and arsenic along the profile line.