Em. Elkattan et al., APPLICATION OF GROUND GEOPHYSICAL-DATA TO URANIUM MINERALIZATION IN THE EL-MISSIKAT AREA, CENTRAL EASTERN-DESERT, EGYPT, Journal of African earth sciences, and the Middle East, 22(1), 1996, pp. 81-91
The El-Missikat prospect Lies in the Eastern Desert of Egypt, 85 km fr
om Qena along the river Nile. The area of the prospect is covered by p
ink granites of the Gabal (G.) El-Missikat pluton from the south and q
uartz diorite from the north, as well as wad alluvium at Wadi El-Missi
kat, which passes through the study area from south to north. The impo
rtance of the study area comes from previous studies, airborne geophys
ics, surface and mining geology and ground spectrometric and magnetic
studies, which prove that the area has radioactive mineralization zone
s at the northeastern periphery of G. El-Missikat. These mineralized z
ones lie along northeast-southwest jasperiod veins and shear zones whi
ch occur inside the granitic rocks. The previous studies concluded tha
t the radioactive mineralization was mostly associated with sulphides,
especially at the reduction zones. These sulphides give a good respon
se to electrical or electromagnetic techniques. Accordingly, the prese
nt study uses self potential, electrically induced polarization and ho
rizontal loop electromagnetic surveys to explore the extension of the
mineralization zones at the subsurface. The self potential (SP) techni
que shows that there are numerous (31) mineralized zones. Most of thes
e zones are distributed in the southern part of the area along the con
tact between the quartz diorite, the granite and the shear zones insid
e the El-Missikat granitic pluton. In addition, the induced polarizati
on (IP) method is applied on two selected profiles (450E and 500E) to
delineate the subsurface contact between granite and quartz diorite in
Wad El-Missikat and to calculate the shape and depth of the mineraliz
ation zones in the subsurface along these profiles. The horizontal loo
p electromagnetic survey, which was applied on three selected profiles
, delineated some weak mineralization occurrences corresponding to the
shear zones. The integration of the results obtained using these thre
e techniques, in addition to the different ground geophysical methods
prviously used, make it possible to determine the most appropriate zon
es for developement of exploration at the area of investigation.