Silicon Dioxide is one of the most abundant compounds on the planet earth and has many different uses.

Silicone can be easily found in the earths crust in crystalline form or in amorphous powder form. Silicon and oxygen together are responsible for 75% of the earths crust. Sand is Silicon Dioxide and that makes sandy areas such as the beach, desserts, and other sandy areas a good resource for silicon dioxide. Silicon dioxide can be found in the earth crust in quartz form also.

            Silicon dioxide is a compound of many uses and has been for many years. Silicon Dioxide , because of its abundance, is the compound that is used commercially as a resource for pure silicon. To extract the silicon large furnaces are used to heat the silicon dioxide, removing the oxygen and leaving pure silicon behind. Today, the modern electronics world greatly depends on silicon dioxide for the manufacture of semiconductors, wire insulation, and fiber optic cables. Its high melting temperature and its chemical stability make it perfect ingredient for insulating wires. Since quartz (SiO2) has piezoelectric properties this makes silicon an evermore-valuable compound to modern electronics. Piezoelectric means that it has the capabilities converting mechanical energy to electric energy and electric energy to mechanical energy.  This property of quartz allows for radio and TV stations to transmit, stabilize, and receive signals. Sonar also uses this piezoelectric property to detect vibrations. Wrist watches, such as the famous Rolex, use quartz to help keep accurate time. Today the oil industry uses silicon dioxide gel to help refine crude oil into usable fuel such as gasoline. Silicon dioxide is also often applied in field of engineering. Silicon dioxide is used in glasses for windows( not to mention may other things made of glass), metal alloys, pipe flux, metal alloys, concrete, sand for foundations, sealants, sandblasting, and many more applications. These are a few of  the main applications of silicon dioxide and there are a few more listed below.

Some other uses include…

• Petroleum products
• Molds for castings
• Refractive pieces (lenses, prisms…)
• Thickening agent in medicines
• Precision measurement equipment (balances, gravimeters, galvanometers…)
• Detergents