Diamonds Of The River

A new source of diamonds could soon be unearthed in central Russia thanks to a novel isotope-hydro geochemical technique developed by scientists at the Research Institute of Geological and Geo ecological Problems, in Cheboksary, 400 miles east of Moscow in the Volga-Vyatka region.
Studies of the region around the River Karla, which encompasses the southwestern part of Chuvashia and part of the Tatar Republic, have revealed a plethora of subterranean kimberlitic pipes. Five circular zones between 40 and 50 kilometers across could harbor diamond seams.
In the 1980s, geologists in Moscow found several small diamonds and minerals, such as zircon, garnet, and corundum, in the alluvia of the River Karla. Such minerals always coincide withkimberlitic tubes of igneous rock just a few million years old. The findings hinted at the existence of these volcanically formed tubes across the central part of the East European tectonic plate, but pinpointing diamond deposits in several hundred meters of rock remained unviable until the development of the new technique.
The Cheboksary scientists, led by Anatoly Tichonov, have used the invention of their Moscow colleagues Vladimir Polyakov and Maria Yezhova (of the All-Russia Research Institute of Geology), who tested its validity on known deposits in Yakutia.
The technique works on the basis that kimberlitic pipes always coincide with subterranean waters in which the ratio of uranium isotopes is strictly fixed, while the content of zinc, lead, aluminium, and zircon is increased. On the basis of an analysis of these minerals and uranium isotope ratios, a contour of the area can be drawn up. The values of alpha-activities of isotopes 234U/238U = g in subterranean waters are measured with the help of a highly accurate ionization alpha-spectrometer, Tichonov told Reactive Reports. The quality of any diamonds present in the area is not yet known.