The term "rare earth minerals" refers to a group of 17 chemical elements that are found in the Earth's crust. These elements, which include metals such as lanthanum, cerium, neodymium and praseodymium, are often referred to collectively as rare earth elements or REEs for short. Despite their name, they are not actually all that rare when found in nature - the term "rare" refers more to their distribution rather than their abundance.
Rare earth minerals have a wide range of industrial and commercial applications due to their unique chemical properties. They are used in everything from high-tech electronics such as smartphones, computers and televisions, to traditional industries like automotive, aerospace and defense. Due to the increasing demand for these elements, there has been growing interest in finding new sources of rare earth minerals and developing more efficient methods of extracting them from the Earth's crust.