In 500 pages incorporating 215 illustrations (50 in colour) and numerous tables, the reader can get a clear idea about what are metals, how they are enriched by natural processes in the Earth’s crust, how they are located by geophysicists, exploited by mining engineers, concentrated by mineral dressing engineers, and finally treated by extractive metallurgists to get pure metals for everyday life. The book also includes a short historical account, basic theory, and an appendix giving a summary of the extraction scheme of each metal as well as a list of audiovisual documents related to metal extraction. The book contains also questions and problems for students