Silicate mineral

A silicate mineral is a mineral that has a combination of the elements silicon and oxygen.  In other words, a silicate mineral has one or more silicates.  These minerals (especially feldspar) make up about 90% of the Earth's crust. 

On Earth, a wide variety of silicate minerals occur in an even wider range of combinations as a result of the processes that form and re-work the crust. These processes include partial melting, crystallization, fractionation, metamorphism, weathering and diagenesis. Living things also contribute to the silicate cycle near the Earth's surface. A type of plankton known as diatoms construct their exoskeletons, known as tests, from silica. The tests of dead diatoms are a major constituent of deep ocean sediment