how are two ways that minerals form?
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Wow, this would take a book to explain in detail!  I'll try to explain as briefly as I can. \n\nMost minerals are crystals*.  \n\nCrystals are basically formed by an arrangement of atoms in a pattern that repeats itself in 3D.  They start as a small cluster of atoms which grows into a recognisable crystal as more atoms are attracted by the electrical forces of those already in the crystal structure.  \n\nCrystals are formed mainly from molten solids (such as in molten magma) and solution (in water) and less often, from vapors (i.e. gases).  \n\n* Some minerals are not crystalline.  E.g. Opal, Obsidian.  These exhibit an amorphous character, meaning they have no crystal form or structure.  \n\nHope that helps a little!
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There are many minerals in the ocean, actually, the mixture is just predominately salt. All the minerals come from..rocks! Well, not just rocks but silt and other things that are basically rock-debris. Rocks, shockingly, have quite a bit of salt in them and the ocean, for billions of years, has been wearing away at the rocks on Earth. How did all that salt get in the rock? Well, they don't really know that part yet.
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Metamorphic rocks are formed when other kinds of rocks are changed by great heat and pressure inside the earth. The word "metamorphic" means changed. Think of metamorphic rocks as recycled rocks. When igneous, sedimentary or even metamorphic rocks get buried deep beneath the surface of the earth, over millions of years the heat and pressure inside the earth change them into something else. Limestone can be changed to marble, sandstone can be changed into quartzite, and shale can be changed to slate. It's just another example of how the earth is constantly changing!\n\n=)
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Ferromagnesium minerals: silicates with iron and magnesium in their formula, dark colored and dense. Example includes hornblende. \nNonferromagnesium mineral: silicates with no iron or magnesium in their formula (calcium, sodium or potassium common), light colored. Example includes feldspar.
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I'll make it easy for you.All the metals forms positive ions by losing electrons and all non-metals form negative ions by gaining electrons.\nExample:- NaCl  Na+ & Cl-
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where the precipitate is formed you have a chemical reaction because the precipitate signals it, there are also color changes and temp changes that can signal to you that it is a chemical raction.\n\n\nthe other one is a physical reaction
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Igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary rocks all have the potential to become one of each of the other types of rock through the rock cycle. Igneous and metamorphic rocks can be broken down into rock fragments and cemented to form a sedimentary rock. Sedimentary or igneous rocks can undergo changes in temperature and pressure to form metamorphic rocks. And all three types can be melted and reformed as igneous rocks.
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The key word here is 'form'. Sedimentary rocks can be broken down into three informal groups. The first group is known as siliciclastic, or just as clastics and these include rocks like sandstone, shale, and conglomerates. These rocks are transported and deposited by water, wind, or gravity. Eventually when they are buried under enough pressure they will become lithified by diagenesis. That is a process that 'cements' them together. They are also described as allocthonous, meaning they originated in a different place from where they were deposited. \n\nThe second informal group of sedimentary rocks are carbonates. Carbonates include limestone and dolomite. These rocks are mostly built by living organisms. Shells from marine organisms, corals, and many algaes all form carbonate rocks. Some but not all carbonates are autochthonous, meaning they originated in the place they were found. Carbonate rocks often form as rock quite quickly and undergo various stages of later diagenesis. The key thing to remember about carbonate rocks is they were "born" and not just transported like clastics. Most carbonates are formed in the ocean. \n\nThe third informal group of sedimentary rocks are called chemical sedimentary rocks. These form by evaporation or precipitation from water, so at some point they were completely dissolved. Examples of this type of rock are gypsum, halite (sodium chloride salt), and sylvite (potassium chloride salt). These rocks can form under certain ocean conditions or in places like dry lakes where the evaporation leaves them behind.\n\nSo the short answer:\n1. by transport\n2. in place by living organisms\n3. by chemical deposition
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The stability of individual minerals, or combinations of minerals is governed by the energetics of the minerals themselves.  More specifically, it is governed by the thermodynamics of the minerals or the possible combinations of minerals that may form from the chemical elements present.  In essence, thermodynamic principles require that the most stable state of any chemical system be the state characterized by the lowest possible Gibbs Free Energy (G).  Reduced to the simplest of terms, G represents a combination of the "heat content" or enthalpy (H) of a mineral phase (or assemblage of phases), and the product of temperature and entropy (S)  [G = H-TS].  The most stable state of a system is the one with the lowest Gibbs Free Energy.  It turns out that both H and S are functions of temperature and pressure, consequently G is dependent on P and T, and hence mineral stability is strongly controlled by temperature and pressure.
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If I remember correctly from my science classes, a mineral is essentially a solid substance that has a crystal structure.  (That's two right there - It's solid, and has to be crystal in structure.)  It also has to be inorganic and occurs naturally, and also homogenous.  Not to mention the fact that it's supposed to have a defined chemical composition.  That's more than four characteristics, but I believe them to be all true of minerals....
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Here, try this:\n\nhttp://www.rocks-and-minerals.com/\n\nCheers.
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You know, it might be kinda fun asking questions through this format, but you will learn it better by actually doing the studying yourself. \n\nRemember that "conservation of matter" has to do with keeping stuff the same. The rock cycle is very broad and covers all the rock processes, both contact and regional metamorphism have changes in crystal types occurring, so sedimentation has to be the best illustration of conservation of matter. \n\nBut go back to your notes and your text and then rewrite the information in your own words to make it stick in your head.
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Sedimentary rocks can be divided into two major informal groups, referred to as clastics (or siliciclastics) and carbonates. Clastic rocks are formed by erosion of other rocks, igneous, metamorphic and sedimentary. These 'clasts' can be mud, silt, sand, cobbles, or boulders, and are transported by wind, water, or gravity and accumulate where they eventually are buried and pressure and temperature subject them to diagenesis, the process that makes them from unconsolidated clasts to one rock mass. Shale, sandstone, and conglomerate are examples of clastics.\n\nCarbonates can work much differently since they form primarily in the oceans. Many carbonates are made from reefs and other living organisms that grow in the ocean. As these organisms die and leave behind their carbonate skeletons, rocks are formed. Other carbonates are formed from small grains called ooids, small balls that form by precipitating out of sea water, possibly with the help of bacteria or algae. Some ocean algae even form carbonate 'mud' that eventually becomes hard rock. \n\nAnother unusual group of sedimentary rocks are called evaporites. These are rocks like gypsum and rock salt that are deposited by evaporation of water in confined basins. \n\nThe most fascinating part about sedimentary rocks is that they have a past, each one tells a story.
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Precipitation:: Precipitation is the formation of a solid in a solution during a chemical reaction. When the chemical reaction occurs the solid formed is called the precipitate. This can occur when an insoluble substance, the precipitate, is formed in the solution due to a reaction or when the solution has been supersaturated by a compound. The formation of a precipitate is a sign of a chemical change. In most situations, the solid forms ("falls") out of the solute phase, and sinks to the bottom of the solution (though it will float if it is less dense than the solvent, or form a suspension).\n\nThis effect is useful in many industrial and scientific applications whereby a chemical reaction may produce a solid that can be collected from the solution by various methods (e.g. filtration, decanting, centrifuging). Precipitation from a solid solution is also a useful way to strengthen alloys.\n\nAn important stage of the precipitation process is the onset of nucleation. The creation of a hypothetical solid particle includes the formation of an interface, which requires some energy based on the relative surface energy of the solid and the solution. If this energy is not available, and no suitable nucleation surface is available, supersaturation occurs.\n\n\n\nAggregation::Particle aggregation in materials science is direct mutual attraction between particles (atoms or molecules) via van der Waals forces or chemical bonding.\n\n\n\nCoagulation::The transformation of liquid into jelly like semisolid mass.\n\n\nFlocculation::Flocculation refers to a process where a solute comes out of solution in the form of floc or "flakes." The term is also used to refer to the process by which fine particulates are caused to clump together into floc. The floc may then float to the top of the liquid, settle to the bottom of the liquid, or can be readily filtered from the liquid.
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Water.\n\nWater is one of the key parts of the formation of magma in subduction zones. The water that is in the subducting plate lowers the melting point of the rock by a few hundred degrees C. The water in the subduction plate will boil and migrate upwards into the overlying wedge of mantle rock where it will reduce the melting point of the overlying mantle. This magma will migrate upwards and form a volcano. \n\nAnother part of this process is that within rock there are many different minerals, all with different melting points, so the ones that melt at the lowest temperatures tend to form magma first, so the resulting magma comes from a partial melt of the source rock.\n\nHere's another diagram (I'd draw you my own but I can't post anything but text here):\nhttp://earth.leeds.ac.uk/dynamicearth/subduction/cordillera_islandarc.htm
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Minerals are natural compounds formed through geological processes. The term "mineral" encompasses not only the material's chemical composition but also the mineral's structure. Minerals range in composition from pure elements and simple salts to very complex silicates with thousands of known forms (organic compounds are usually excluded). The study of minerals is called mineralogy.\n\nAn ore is a volume of rock containing components or minerals in a mode of occurrence which renders it valuable for mining. An ore must contain materials which are:\n\nvaluable \nin concentrations which can be profitably mined \nable to be extracted from waste rock by mineral processing techniques. \nOre deposits are mineral deposits defined as being economically recoverable. Mineral deposits may include those bodies of mineralisation which are uneconomic resources, of too low a grade or tonnage or technically impossible for extraction of the contained metal.\n\nWhat is valuable to mine is generally considered in terms of purely economic considerations. However, cultural, strategic or social goals of nations, tribes and individuals may render economically unfeasible bodies of rock valuable for extraction, for instance ochre, some clays and ornamental stones which are of religious, cultural or sentimental value to a population. Here, value is placed on the rock in non-economic terms.\n\nOre is thus an economic entity, not a physical entity. Fluctuations in commodity prices will determine what rock is considered valuable and hence ore, and what rock is not valuable and is considered waste. Similarly, the costs of extraction may fluctuate, for example with fuel costs, rendering mining unprofitable and turning ore into waste.\n\nThe grade or contained concentration of an ore mineral, or metal, as well as its form of occurrence, will directly affect the costs associated with mining the ore. The cost of extraction must thus be weighted against the contained metal value of the rock and a 'cut-off grade' used to define what is ore and what is waste.\n\nOre minerals are generally oxides, sulfides, silicates, or native metals that are not commonly concentrated in the Earth's crust. The ores must be processed to extract the metals of interest from the waste rock and from the ore minerals.\n\nOre bodies are formed by a variety of geological processes. The process of ore formation is called ore genesis.\n\nSome important ore minerals:\n\nArgentite\nBarite\nBeryl\nBornite\nCassiterite\nChalcocite\nChalcopyrite\nChromite\nCinnabar\nCobaltite\nColumbite-Tantalite or Coltan\nGalena\nGold\nHematite\nIlmenite\nMagnetite\nMolybdenite\nPentlandite\nScheelite\nSphalerite\nUraninite\nWolframite
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A mineral can be defined as:\nsomething that is naturally occuring\nsolid\nhas an exact chemical composition\norderly arrangement of internal atoms \n\nwhen different minerals are combined that is what makes a rock. for example granite. Is made of the minerals quartz, pottassium feldspar, muscovite, plagioclase feldspar, and amphibole.