What is oxides in mineralogy ?
Oxides : definition
This subclass of the class "oxides - hydroxides" includes nearly 350 minerals, mainly compounds of metals and metalloids with oxygen. It includes "multiple oxides" which from a strictly chemical point of view should be considered as salts : tantalates, niobates, titanates, uranates and antimoniates.
Oxides are a mineralogical group whose common characteristics are a fairly high density and hardness. They are common accessory minerals of igneous and metamorphic rocks which are found in detrital grains in sedimentary rocks, due to their inalterability.
The most common are magnetite, hematite, rutile, cuprite, ilmenite. Many metals find their main ore among oxides : iron (magnetite and hematite), titanium (rutile and ilmenite), tin (cassiterite), manganese (pyrolusite), uranium (uraninite), chromium (chromite), etc...