Petrographic, Mineralogical And Geochemicalcharacterization Of Volcanic Products From North-East Morocco
International Journal of Development Research
Petrographic, Mineralogical And Geochemicalcharacterization Of Volcanic Products From North-East Morocco
Received 14th May 2020; Received in revised form 26th June 2020; Accepted 07th July 2020; Published online 26th August 2020
Copyright © 2020, Hanane AIT HMEID et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Seven types of bentonite profiles from the Trebia quarry located in the Jbel Tidiennit-Nador region (north-eastern Morocco) were sampled and studied for their physical, chemical, mineralogical and petrographic characteristics and evolution. Selected samples were analyzed by X-ray diffraction (XRD), IR spectroscopy (FTIR), chemical analysis (XRF) and the petrographic study (microscopy). The results show that clay minerals, K-feldspar, hematite, anorthite, and cristobalite were present as dominant phases with minor content of quartz, anatase, calcite, dolomite, xenotime, pyrite, rhodochrosite, and zeolite. A large amount of the main oxides in the Fe samples ranged between 28.6 and 48.9% Si content (from 0.1 to 16.7%). The clay fraction (<2 μm) consists mainly of smectite (> 90%), associated with trace amount of illite identified in all samples. In this study, we conclude of hydrothermal alteration.
