Minerals

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Minerals

• Notesred

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What is a mineral?

• Mineral- A mineral is a naturally formed,
  inorganic solid with a crystalline structure.
• Not all minerals look like gems in fact, most
  look like rocks! Rocks are actually made of many
  minerals but minerals are not made of rocks.

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Mineral vs Rock

• In order to be a mineral, it must have these four
  properties
• It has to be a solid
• It has to be formed in nature
• It has to be inorganic
• It has to have a crystalline structure
• But what do those mean?

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Solid

• The three phases of matter are solid, liquid, and
  gas.
• A solid has a defined shape it does not change.
• Minerals cannot be liquids or gases but can be
  found in and around liquids and gases.

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Formed in nature

• In order to be a mineral, it has to be created in
  nature.
• There are many things that are man-made items.
  These items, which can even sometimes look like
  minerals, are not minerals because they do not
  form in nature!
• It has to be naturally occurring!! Something you
  could dig up or find lying around.

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Inorganic

• Inorganic means not organic or not living
• Minerals must be things that are not alive.

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Crystalline structure

• When you think of crystals you usually think of a
  rigid structure. The exact shape depends on the
  arrangement of atoms.
• Almost all minerals are made of the one chemical
  composition throughout.

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Chemical composition?

• composition what something is made of
• Minerals are made of elements. All minerals
  have one or more of the 92 elements that are
  present on the Earths crust.

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More on elements

• An element is made of only one kind of atom.
• An atom is the basic unit of an element.
• Some minerals have more than one element. These
  minerals are made of compounds of elements.
  (think compound words)
• A compound has 2 or more elements that are bonded
  together.

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Types of minerals

• There are two major types of minerals
• Silicate minerals contain a combination of
  silicon and oxygen.
• 90 of the Earths crust are silicate minerals
• Nonsilicate minerals do not have a combination of
  silicon and oxygen.
• Some examples are carbon, oxygen, iron, and
  sulfur.

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Properties of minerals

• How can you tell two minerals apart? Scientists
  have organized mineral properties into categories
  to help identify unknown minerals.
• The seven major properties of minerals are
• Color, luster, streak, cleavage, fracture,
  hardness, and density.

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Color

• What color you see

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Luster

• How the mineral reflects light. Think shiny
  and dull

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Streak

• The color of the mineral when in powder form.
  Color does not equal streak!!!
• In order to find streak, the mineral needs to be
  rubbed against a porcelain streak plate.

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Cleavage

• How often a mineral breaks along a flat surface

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Fracture

• How often a mineral breaks unevenly, curved, or
  rigidly. (Think fractured bones!)

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Hardness

• How resistant the mineral is to being scratched.
• Uses Mohs hardness scale

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Density

• How much matter (mass) is in the amount of space
  (volume). (remember Dm/v?)
• The bones below have the same volume but
  different densities.

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Other properties

• Some minerals have other special properties.
• They are fluorescence, optical properties,
  radioactivity, magnetism, taste, and reactions to
  chemicals.

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Homework

• Read pages 60-66
• Do page 63 1-4 in your science notebook
• Note that you are not doing page 66 homework
  questions. Those will be assigned next class.