Study and Prospect for Sedimentology of Uranium Deposit

Key words: 
• sedimentology of the uranium deposits /
• sandstone type uranium deposits /
• depositional system /
• sequence stratigraphy /
• depositional environment /
• uranium accumulation

Abstract: With the rapid development of the exploration and development of uranium deposit, especially sandstone-type uranium deposits, the sedimentology of sandstone-type uranium deposit is proposed. The sedimentology of the uranium deposits is a branch of learning to research uranium mineralization, forming environment, characteristics of uranium-bearing rock series, and the enrichment mechanism and distribution of uranium under sedimentary control during the formation and evolution of sedimentary basins. It combines uranium geology, basin analysis and other disciplines, having the obvious interdisciplinary characteristics. The sedimentology of sandstone-type uranium deposits is the most typical representative of uranium deposit sedimentology, it is on the basis of basin analysis and sandstone-type uranium geology, combining sedimentological techniques, make a specific study on sandstone-type uranium deposit formation of material source, diagenesis and the preliminary enrichment of uranium, sediment structure and permeability, depositional system and uranium-bearing rock series analysis, fluid effect and later reformation, sequence stratigraphic and the spatial distribution of uranium, uranium enrichment factor and sedimentation and the ancient climate environment, sedimentation factors and prediction of sandstone type uranium deposits, as well as the management informationization of 3D visual modeling, and so on. In this paper, the representative sandstone type uranium deposits of Yili Basin, Turpan-Hami basin which are in Xinjiang Province and the north of Ordos Basin are taken as an example. We analyze the latest development and cognition of sedimentary uranium deposit study about it from three aspects, including the relationship between the uranium accumulation and sediment formation-evolution process、the relationship between the characteristics of sediments and depositional system analysis and uranium accumulation and the relationship between the sequence stratigraphy and accumulation effect of the uranium. Meanwhile, the development trend of the sedimentology of the uranium deposits is prospected. And we think that "large-scale mineralization" of sandstone uranium and the key geological environment of "exceptional enrichment" of uranium, rock uranium deposit and the spatial distribution of uranium and a variety of applications of high and new analytical techniques will be the focus of future research and development of uranium sedimentology. Because the relationship between the sedimentology of the uranium deposits and human existence is important, and the sedimentology of the uranium deposits is related among many aspects of sedimentary science, it is reasonable to believe that the future of the sedimentology of the uranium deposits may be an independent branch of sedimentology and will be well studied and developed.