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Eagle Star Minerals (CVE:EGE), an explorer of agro-mineral properties in Brazil, appointed Dr. José Eloi Guimarães Campos as a new director to the board, on Tuesday.

Dr. Guimarães Campos has over 22 years of experience in the field of estratigraphy, sedimentation and tectonic evolution.

Specifically, his expertise lies in sedimentary, metamorphic and alkaline igneous rock occurrences, as well as sedimentary phosphate deposits and their geological structure within Brazil.

Dr. Campos now serves as the sedimentology, hydrogeology and soil sciences professor at the University of Brasilia, and is a member of the Brazilian Society of Geology (SBG), Regional Advice of Geology (CREA) and the Association of Professors of the University of Brasilia (ADUnB).

"We are extremely excited about our newest addition to the Eagle Star team," said president and CEO of Eagle Star Minerals, Eran Friedlander.

"We believe the expertise, knowledge and contacts that Dr. Guimarães Campos brings to the company are second to none. Furthermore, his decision to come on board lends strong support to the credibility of not only our projects, but our overall strategy moving forward."

Dr. Campos has consulted with many agro-mineral projects throughout different regions of Brazil. He acted as co-advisor to the technical study of the Campos Belos / Itafós Arraias phosphate deposit in Goiás-Tocantins state, now owned and operated by MBAC Fertilizer Corp., which included the in-depth observation of the geological modeling of the deposit.

He also took part in a technical study and discussion of the genesis and controls of the Rocinha phosphate deposit in the Lagamar region of Minas Gerais.

Most recently, he worked in the re-evaluation of the Córrego Rico limestone deposit to cement production, which included regional geology framing, drilling log analysis, and reserves definition, and assisted with geological mapping and mineral deposit characterization for the Brazilian Geological Survey (CPRM).

He obtained his Master's Degree in Geology in 1992, and continued on to complete his Doctorate Degree in 1996, both from the University of Brasilia, FD, Brazil.

"Our team is looking forward to utilizing the phosphate specific knowhow of Dr. Guimarães Campos towards the development of our current projects and we believe that with his regional knowledge of the surrounding geology, more opportunities may also present themselves to Eagle Star," said Friedlander.

The company, which was initially focused on developing its Brazilian Angico iron ore project, said in February it had recognized certain "opportunistic trends" in Brazil over the past year, taking note of a significant lack of sufficient domestic supply of agro-minerals, and as a result, decided to reposition itself to focus on agro-minerals projects in the country.

Earlier this year, Eagle Star acquired the Samba phosphate project located in the western portion of Piaui state in Brazil, and has staked areas with significant potential to host large phosphate deposits.

Under the terms of the recent agreement, Eagle Star can earn a 100 percent interest in the Samba project - which it now considers its flagship property.

The 109,285-hectare Samba property, which consists of 60 mineral claims, is located near the cities of Valenca and Sao Jose do Peixe in Brazil, and near Eagle Star's Ruth phosphate project.

The new asset is also located near potential future end-markets, including the Balsas and Bom Jesus agricultural centres - which are home to a large soy growing industry with production of over 2.3 million tonnes of beans annually - the company said.

The proximity to its own Ruth project is not a coincidence, as preliminary exploration work done at Ruth led Eagle Star's team to investigate other areas with a "similar geological setting", which ultimately led to the discovery and acquisition of Samba.

Investigator Resources (ASX: IVR) shares have risen nearly 12% intra-day today on a day when the broader Australian market is a sea of red, the reason being the start of the next phase of drilling at its Paris silver prospect following up previous stellar high grade silver intersections.

Astute investors will realise these previous intersections, which include up to 2.25% silver, are extremely high grade and rarely found in Australia.

Adding extra spice to the exploration equation is the regional graphite potential with widespread hits recorded in historic drill data, including a substantial shallow intersection of 15 metres at 12% total graphitic carbon at the Barna Hill tenement.

A preliminary review of the graphite potential within Investigator's regional tenements has identified several areas with good potential where graphitic schists were intersected in past drilling.

High grade silver

Last month Investigator uncovered the first of the mineralised feeder structures at Paris which indicates a 3 to 7 metre wide vertical structure assaying over 400g/t silver.

Importantly, this discovery offers depth extensions for high grade silver mineralisation with increasing gold credits already evident in some of the intersections.

Recent assay highlights include 7 metres at 1,810g/t silver from 31 metres, 10 metres at 432g/t silver from 49 metres and 19 metres at 965g/t silver from 42 metres.

From the central feeder zone, notable intersections included 14 metres at greater than 427g/t silver from 97 metres.

The potential depth extensions to the Central Feeder were previously recognised with consistent intersections of up to 14 metres at 907g/t silver achieved by prior shallow drilling along 500 metres of strike tested.

Investigator has identified new feeder targets with an aggregate of another 2 kilometres of untested strike length which adds considerable exploration potential to Paris.

Further exploration upside was found from an initial petrological study which showed the silver is dominantly primary sulphide mineralisation, which is a positive for potential recoveries.

Drilling progress

One diamond drill rig has begun large diameter coring for geological and metallurgical assessment. A total of three large diameter holes will drill the North East manto zone, the northern end of the Central Feeder and the South East manto zone.

Another drill rig will also begin soon to start testing the Central Feeder zone and other feeder targets along with the first rig when it finishes the large diameter holes.

Eyre Peninsula - Emerging Mining Province

The Paris prospect lies adjacent to a new mining operation about 50 kilometres away on the Eyre Peninsula in South Australia.

The prospect is situated around 17 kilometres from the township of Kimba and the Eyre Highway, and about 200 kilometres from heavy engineering facilities in Whyalla and Port Augusta.

Interestingly, Paris is also located around 250 kilometres southwest of BHP Billiton's (ASX: BHP) Olympic Dam operation and about 350 kilometres south of OZ Minerals' (ASX: OZL) Prominent Hill mine.

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Lachlan Star's (ASX: LSA) progress at the CMD Gold Mine in Chile is continuing to attract investor interest, with votes of confidence coming from two investment companies.

Intact Investment Management has taken up an initial substantial shareholding of 9.66% in Lachlan Star, buying up 8.34 million shares over a period of about 4 months.

Meanwhile, existing substantial shareholder Sentry Investments has taken up a further 2.6 million shares in May, taking its total shareholding to 9.4 million, equivalent to a 10.91% interest.

Lachlan Star is continuing to outperform at the CMD Gold Mine, revealing earlier this month that the company had delivered its highest level of gold stacked for the mine since it took ownership of the operation.

For the month of April the unhedged gold producer stacked 6,000 ounces of gold. A further achievement was the increase in the grade of the stacked ore to 0.61 grams per tonne, the highest stacked grade since October last year.

This increase was achieved despite the company not mining in the Chisperos and Las Loas pits for most of the month.

Lachlan Star is working to optimise its mining costs by converting part of the CMD Mine operations to owner mining, which is expected to deliver cost savings of US$100 to $150 per gold ounce.

Mining contractors on site will be rationalised from three contractors down to one, delivering an immediate saving on mining unit rates.

Unhedged gold production rising

In March Lachlan Star had unhedged gold production of around 57,500 ounces per annum, however the company is looking to increase this to 75,000 ounces per annum in the next 12 months.

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