Australian scientists have developed a technique which could see increased speed in the eternal rush for gold.

CSIRO in collaboration with Canadian company Mevex have conducted a pilot study showing gamma-activation analysis (GAA) offers a faster and more accurate way to find gold in ore.

The new X-Ray technique dominates traditional chemical analysis methods in terms of speed and accuracy. It should allow gold miners to measure processing plants with greater precision, to monitor process performance and recover small traces of gold – worth millions of dollars – that would otherwise be discarded.
The X-Rays are used in much the same way and at about the same level of energy as medical applications, by scanning mineral samples the x-rays activate gold particles which are then picked up by a super-sensitive detector.

According to project leader Dr James Tickner, the study showed that this method is two-to-three times more accurate than the standard industry technique 'fire assay', which requires samples to be heated up to 1200°C.

There a range of improvements in the gamma-activation analysis (GAA) technique over previous methods, according to Dr Tickner: “Fire assay usually involves sending samples off to a central lab and waiting several days for the results. Using GAA we can do the analysis in a matter of minutes, allowing companies to respond much more quickly to the data they're collecting... a compact GAA facility could even be trucked out to remote sites for rapid, on-the-spot analysis.”
GAA is also reportedly much more environmentally friendly than the large scale immolation of ore.

The improved accuracy and reduction of missed and wasted gold could easily save billions in current gold operations.

The team hopes to roll out the new technology as soon as possible, planning to build a full-scale analysis facility within the next two years.