Silicate vs. Silicon

In chemistry, a silicate is any member of a family of anions consisting of silicon and oxygen, usually with the general formula [SiO(4−2x)−4−x]n, where 0 ≤ x < 2. The family includes orthosilicate SiO4−4 (x = 0), metasilicate SiO2−3 (x = 1), and pyrosilicate Si2O6−7 (x = 0.5, n = 2).

Silicon is a chemical element with the symbol Si and atomic number 14. It is a hard, brittle crystalline solid with a blue-grey metallic lustre, and is a tetravalent metalloid and semiconductor.

Any of numerous compounds containing silicon, oxygen, and one or more metals; a salt of silicic acid.

A nonmetallic element occurring extensively in the earth's crust in silica and silicates, having both a brown amorphous and a gray lustrous crystalline allotrope, and used doped or in combination with other materials in glass, semiconducting devices, concrete, brick, refractories, pottery, and silicones. Atomic number 14; atomic weight 28.086; melting point 1,414°C; boiling point 3,265°C; specific gravity 2.33 (25°C); valence 2, 4. See Periodic Table.

Any of a large group of minerals, forming over 90 percent of the earth's crust, that consist of SiO2 or SiO4 groupings combined with one or more metals and sometimes hydrogen.

A nonmetallic element (symbol Si) with an atomic number of 14 and atomic weight of 28.0855.

(inorganic chemistry) Any salt of silica or of one of the silicic acids; any mineral composed of silicates

A single atom of this element.

A salt of silicic acid.

(slang) computing

a salt or ester derived from silicic acid

(slang) computer processor

abbreviation of silicon chip

A nonmetalic element analogous to carbon. It always occurs combined in nature, and is artificially obtained in the free state, usually as a dark brown amorphous powder, or as a dark crystalline substance with a meetallic luster. Its oxide is silica, or common quartz, and in this form, or as silicates, it is, next to oxygen, the most abundant element of the earth's crust. Silicon is characteristically the element of the mineral kingdom, as carbon is of the organic world. Symbol Si. Atomic weight 28. Called also silicium.

a tetravalent nonmetallic element; next to oxygen it is the most abundant element in the earth's crust; occurs in clay and feldspar and granite and quartz and sand; used as a semiconductor in transistors