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Skarns are one of the most common deposit types with significant economic values, and they are typically part of magmatic hydrothermal systems. Skarns may extend towards the causative intrusions to porphyry or greisen deposits, and towards distal locations to carbonate replacement deposits, and farther away to Carlin- or Carlin-like deposits. For the exploration of skarn and related deposits, zoning is an effective tool. In addition, in skarn-porphyry districts there are typically many intrusions. To identify the causative intrusion, zoning is an important, sometimes the only tool. In this presentation, zoning patterns in both alteration and mineralization will be summarized and explained.

Zhaoshan Chang is the Charles Fogarty Endowed Chair and Professor in Economic Geology at Colorado School of Mines (CSM), Golden, Colorado. He previously worked at various universities, including Peking University, China (1997–2000); Washington State University, USA (2004); the Center for Ore Deposit and Earth Sciences (CODES), University of Tasmania (2004–2011), and the Economic Geology Research Centre (EGRU), James Cook University (2011–2018). He was the director of EGRU from 2012 to 2018 before joining CSM. Zhaoshan has studied a wide spectrum of mineral systems in 14 countries, including skarn, porphyry, epithermal, iron oxide copper-gold, W-Sn, and sediment-hosted gold deposits. He works closely with the mineral industry on exploration-oriented research projects, looking for far-field signals, discriminators, and zoning patterns in mineralogy, textures, spectral features, whole-rock and mineral geochemistry, and isotopic compositions that can be directly used in exploration. He also works on ore-forming processes and ore-controlling factors, magma fertility, regional metallogenesis, and laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) methodology (dating, mineral trace element analysis, isotopic composition analysis). His research mainly involves field investigation and drill core logging, petrography, short wavelength infrared spectral analysis, whole-rock and mineral chemistry, textural imaging using various techniques, geochronology, fluid inclusion thermometry and composition, various isotope systems (O-H-S-C; Cu-Zn-Fe; Sr, Hf), and LA-ICP-MS techniques. He runs an LA-ICP-MS/MS (Agilent 8900) lab at CSM.