Earthquakes produce giant gold nuggets by electrifying quartz to make “natural batteries”

Amazing stuff! Turns out again, earth quakes are not entirely destructive! 😊

Will there be a new gold rush after the next earthquake? Just kidding!

"... To test this hypothesis, researchers conducted an experiment designed to replicate the conditions quartz might experience during an earthquake. They submerged quartz crystals in a gold-rich fluid and applied stress using a motor to simulate the shaking of an earthquake. After the experiment, the quartz samples were examined under a microscope to see if any gold had been deposited.

“The results were stunning,” ... “The stressed quartz not only electrochemically deposited gold onto its surface, but it also formed and accumulated gold nanoparticles,”  ..."

From the abstract:

"Gold nuggets occur predominantly in quartz veins, and the current paradigm posits that gold precipitates from dilute (<1 mg kg−1 gold), hot, water ± carbon dioxide-rich fluids owing to changes in temperature, pressure and/or fluid chemistry. However, the widespread occurrence of large gold nuggets is at odds with the dilute nature of these fluids and the chemical inertness of quartz. Quartz is the only abundant piezoelectric mineral on Earth, and the cyclical nature of earthquake activity that drives orogenic gold deposit formation means that quartz crystals in veins will experience thousands of episodes of deviatoric stress. Here we use quartz deformation experiments and piezoelectric modelling to investigate whether piezoelectric discharge from quartz can explain the ubiquitous gold–quartz association and the formation of gold nuggets. We find that stress on quartz crystals can generate enough voltage to electrochemically deposit aqueous gold from solution as well as accumulate gold nanoparticles. Nucleation of gold via piezo-driven reactions is rate-limiting because quartz is an insulator; however, since gold is a conductor, our results show that existing gold grains are the focus of ongoing growth. We suggest this mechanism can help explain the creation of large nuggets and the commonly observed highly interconnected gold networks within quartz vein fractures."

Earthquakes produce giant gold nuggets by electrifying quartz to make “natural batteries” "New research suggests that electricity generated by earthquakes might be the key to the formation of giant gold nuggets."

Electricity generated by earthquakes might be the secret behind giant gold nuggets (original news release)

Gold nugget formation from earthquake-induced piezoelectricity in quartz (no public access)