TITLE:
Heavy Minerals in Sands along Brahmaputra (Jamuna) River of Bangladesh
AUTHORS:
Md. Ibrahim Khalil, Md. Nazrul Islam Khan, Md. Zafrul Kabir, Ratan Kumar Majumder, Md. Idris Ali, Debasish Paul, Syed Mohammad Azharul Islam
KEYWORDS:
Heavy Minerals, River, Sand, Bangladesh
JOURNAL NAME:
International Journal of Geosciences,
Vol.7 No.1,
January
28,
2016
ABSTRACT: Sands along Brahmaputra
River of Bangladesh have long been considered to be a source of heavy minerals
(HMs) since it traversed a long way through various terrains. An attempt has
been made under this research work to determine the kinds and amounts of heavy
minerals in the sands sourced from the river system. Samples from 14 locations
along Brahmaputra River covering 30 km distance from upstream to downstream of
the river are found to contain different heavy minerals concentration with a
range of 7.92 - 25.16 weight% with the remaining of the sample comprising
silicate and aluminosilicates. Mineral characterization from peak positions in
diffractogram of X-ray Diffraction (XRD) evaluate quartz, feldspar and mica are
major categories light mineral while rutile, magnetite, illmenite, zircon,
monazite, garnet, uranium arsenide and uranium fluoride are the major types heavy
minerals. Ilmenite and rutile are main contributors of total heavy mineral
(THM). Titanium bearing minerals ilmenite and rutile contributes 26.22% -
31.01% and 14.57% - 23.50% of THM. In the present study area, most of the sands
are found to be fine and medium grained as obtained from the particle sizes
analysis using 18- to 230-mesh.