Electrical and electromagnetic methods in exploring for seafloor massive sulfide deposits

Abstract

Two marine geophysical methods are tested over a shallowly buried and hydrothermally inactive massive sulfide occurrence at the Palinuro Seamount in the Tyrrhenian Sea. A novel EM configuration consisting of a ship-towed loop transmitter and remote dipole receivers was deployed over the seamount, and electric field transients were successfully recorded by the remote receivers. An SP system consisting of two perpendicular pairs of electrodes towed close to the seafloor was also deployed. Anomalously high electric field strengths were recorded over the zone of known massive sulfide mineralization, demonstrating that the SP method is effective at detecting inactive, buried massive sulfide sites.