Australian Mineral Fields' team of mineral explorers has industry-leading expertise in integrating and applying a range of advanced 3-D and 4-D (time) modeling, simulation and data analysis technologies that can dramatically accelerate the exploration process while reducing risks and costs. The extent and sophistication of the integration allows the team to evaluate, compare and interpret the widest possible range of data more rigorously, rapidly and precisely than ever before.

The exploration team's advanced skills as well as integrated software applications constitute a competitive edge. This edge enables the Company to quickly and cost-effectively complete initial screening of large areas using existing data sets and prioritize their potential for further analysis and investment. Once the priority ground holdings have been identified, infill sampling and more conventional exploration techniques can be applied to progressively test the high-priority targets.

• Exploration in a Mature District
• Integrated Geophysical and Geochemical Techniques
• Leveraging Existing Datasets

EXPLORATION IN A MATURE DISTRICT

Australian Mineral Fields' primary focus area, Western Australia, and in particular its Eastern Goldfields, is considered by some to be a mature exploration district. Even though the region has a long mining history and has experienced substantial exploration activity, this is only partially true. While extensive exploration has taken place in Western Australia, much of this exploration has been superficial. The Company sees significant opportunity in applying its innovative exploration techniques to leverage the intelligence gained from prior exploration to pursue new discoveries.

Western Australia has seen a geologically long period of deep weathering that has resulted in a greater than 90% cover across much of the most prospective rock layers. This cover has paradoxically both allowed and prevented discovery. The cover, dominated by saprolitic regolith, allows for well-defined and understood lateral dispersion processes. Such dispersion, in turn, has made it relatively easy for drilling to identify very significant quantities of typically moderate to large tonnage resources that can be extracted with open-pit mining. The same cover, however, has effectively masked deeper mineralized systems. The relative ease with which near-surface mineralization has been identified in Western Australia has also had the effect of over-simplifying exploration.

Comparing exploration in two similar geological environments, the Kalgoorlie Terrane in the Eastern Goldfields and the Abitibi Terrane in the Superior Province of Canada, illustrates the point. Exploration in Kalgoorlie generated more than 500,000 drill holes, but fewer than 1% penetrated below 100m in depth and fewer than 2% penetrated below 50m. Conversely, the majority of drill holes in the Abitibi Terrane penetrated to at least 100m and many to much greater depths. These differing approaches identified similar amounts of gold in both districts, between 80 million to 100 million ounces.

Analysis of regional data shows that most significant structures in the Eastern Goldfields Province, and elsewhere in similar Archaean Provinces, have moderate levels of anomalous gold, arsenic or antimony along much of their lengths. Using only conventional exploration techniques, including geochemical testing followed by diamond drilling, to define areas of these elements is likely to yield a series of tantalizing results that will ultimately not confirm economic mineralization.

The Australian Mineral Fields team has devoted considerable time and resources to developing a clearer understanding of the geological processes that cause the development of major gold deposits in such structures -- and applying integrated analysis techniques to define clear evidence for their occurrence. This combination of exhaustive geological research and the application of advanced, integrated geophysical and geochemical analysis in alteration zones – or areas in rocks that have been altered -- in major Archaean gold systems enables the Company to more accurately indicate significant pathfinders. These, in turn, can be used as predictive markers for a significant deposit.

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INTEGRATED GEOPHYSICAL AND GEOCHEMICAL TECHNIQUES

Australian Mineral Fields is particularly skilled in using geophysical data to create 2-D and 3-D geophysical maps to pinpoint the most promising ore bodies. The Company integrates these 2-D and 3-D maps with the analysis of geochemical anomalies to further define the area in which the actual mineralization is likely to occur. Australian Mineral Fields applies highly effective advanced techniques such as lithogeochemistry and Portable Infrared Mineral Analyzer (PIMA) in this process.

Lithogeochemistry uses the entire spectrum of elements contained in specific rock samples to define both the actual parent rock composition, providing a better understanding of the geology of the area, and the alteration of the rock. The alteration of the rock, evidence of the hydrothermal processes associated with the development of mineral deposits, while typically covering a much larger area than the deposit itself, varies depending on the proximity to mineralization.

PIMA technology uses SWIR (short wave infrared radiation) in the rapid and cost effective analysis of alteration minerals including analysis of subtle variations in mineral crystallinity and composition. Together lithogeochemisty and PIMA can be used to more accurately determine the most likely areas within a project for significant mineralization to occur.

Following the analysis of geological, geophysical and geochemical data, the exploration team evaluates the most promising anomalies with geological mapping and rock sampling to examine surface targets in two dimensions. Where evidence suggests that the exploration target may be relatively deep or more geologically complex, the Company can develop a 3-D Common Earth model of the target, incorporating all of the known data to better define the target. This can be an effective means of mitigating exploration risk once higher cost tools are needed. For more on the Common Earth Model, the leading edge of integrated imaging, visit these sites:

		www.mirageoscience.com
		www.gocad.com
		Also of interest is Creating a Common Earth Model.

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LEVERAGING EXISTING DATASETS

These advanced exploration techniques are relatively simple to apply and actually leverage results from extensive, prior exploration. Previous drilling in the Eastern Goldfields has provided extensive datasets of bedrock geochemistry, enabling Australian Mineral Fields to resample historic drilling and conduct the advanced tests relatively quickly and cost-effectively to focus exploration within a given project area. These innovations enable the Company to better predict the location and likely style of mineralization, and therefore tailor exploration efforts to more effectively test the defined targets.

Further, in less developed geological terrains, once a conceptual target has been defined, other types of newly developed technologies, such as hydrogeochemistry , enable more effective first pass testing of potentially prospective ground. In particular, new analytical techniques which allow for significantly lower detection limits -- in some cases down to parts per trillion levels -- can be coupled with appropriate sampling protocols to test for covered or deeply buried mineralization in areas where little other data is available.

Find out more about innovative exploration techniques by following these links:

		Alteration Vectors to blind, high grade, Archaean Gold Deposits
		Hydrogeochemical Exploration for Gold in Western Australia
		Creating a Common Earth Model
		www.mirageoscience.com
		www.gocad.com
		Halley Footprints Round Up 2007

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