THERMOLUMINESCENCE FROM IGNEOUS AND NATURAL HYDROTHERMAL VEIN QUARTZ - DOSE-RESPONSE AFTER OPTICAL BLEACHING

We studied optical bleaching and gamma dose response of primary quartz isolated from volcanic and granitic host rocks as well as from pegmatites and hydrothermal veins using thermoluminescence (TL). We attempted to isolate the TL signature of these individual types of quartz so that improved analysis of the TL behaviour of composite sedimentary quartz mixtures is possible. We have identified the following aspects of quartz TL in these samples: (1) large variation in TL residuals after extensive bleaching; (2) shifts in glow curve peak temperatures during bleaching and gamma dose apparently related to 2nd order TL kinetics; (3) differences in TL sensitivity to gamma dose among samples; (4) supralinear dose response of both a 230 degrees C TL peak and a germanium EPR signal only in the pegmatitic quartz samples; and (5) the volcanic and pegmatitic samples had generally higher TL sensitivity to gamma dose than did the granitic or hydrothermal samples. We concluded that (1), (2) and (3) could contribute to enhanced scatter in routine TL dating of sediments composed of mixed fractions of different quartz types, but that none of the effects observed appear to introduce any unforeseen sources of error into ED determinations using any of the standard sediment dating methods.