Abstract:
Mineral exploration has increasingly targeted areas covered by in situ or transported
overburden for shallow to deep-seated orebodies. It remains critical to develop better means to
detect the surficial chemical footprint of mineralized areas covered by thick regolith. In such settings,
plant geochemistry could potentially be a useful exploration tool, as different plant species have
varying degrees of tolerance to metal enrichment in the soil. This review provides insights into
the geological and geochemical controls on metal accumulation patterns in soil–plant systems of
the Central African Copperbelt. In addition, it highlights the opportunities for integrating the
geochemistry of terrestrial plants in emerging exploration technologies, identifies research gaps, and
suggests future directions for developing phytogeochemical sampling techniques. This review was
conducted using reputable online scholarly databases targeting original research articles published
between January 2005 and March 2023, from which selected articles were identified, screened,
and used to explore current advances, opportunities, and future directions for the use of plant
geochemistry in sediment hosted Cu–Co exploration in the Central African Copperbelt. Various
plant species are recognized as ore deposit indicators through either independent phytogeochemistry
or complementary approaches. In the Central African Copperbelt, the successful application of
hyperaccumulator species for phytoremediation provides the basis for adopting phytogeochemistry
in mineral exploration. Furthermore, current advances in remote sensing, machine learning, and
deep learning techniques could enable multi-source data integration and allow for the integration of
phytogeochemistry.
