Helium

Helium Latest News

Recently, the Ministry of Commerce and General Administration of Customs, China, has temporarily but immediately banned helium exports from the country. 

About Helium

• It is an inert gas and does not react with other substances or combust.
• It was discovered in 1868 by Jules Janssen and Norman Lockyer via a yellow spectral line during a solar eclipse. 
• Formation: It is a non-renewable resource generated deep in the earth’s crust, where the radioactive decay of uranium and thorium atoms emits alpha particles, which capture electrons to form helium atoms.

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Properties of Helium

• Its atomic number is 2, making it the second lightest element after hydrogen.
• Helium also has a very low boiling point (-268.9° C), allowing it to remain a gas even in super-cold environments.
• It does not participate easily in chemical reactions.
• Helium is the second-lightest element, after hydrogen, and is not manufactured.
• The gas is non-toxic, but cannot be breathed on its own, because it displaces the oxygen humans need for respiration.
• It is the only element that cannot be solidified by sufficient cooling at normal atmospheric pressure.
• Largest global reserves: United States, Algeria, and Russia.
• India’s Rajmahal Volcanic Basin (Jharkhand) is a significant helium reservoir trapped for billions of years.

Applications of Helium

• Used as Coolant: It is used as coolant to cool the magnets in MRI machines, the silicon wafers in the semiconductor fabricating industry, and, increasingly, some of the devices used in quantum computers.
• Leak Detector: Engineers use helium as a leak-detector.
• Optical Fibre Manufacture: It is also used in the process of drawing optical fibres to rapidly and uniformly cool molten glass and to displace oxygen or nitrogen from forming bubbles inside the material.
• Aerospace: Spaceflight organisations like ISRO, NASA, and SpaceX use helium to pressurise fuel tanks in rockets.
• Research and the tourism sector in many parts of the world also use helium to inflate balloons and airships.

Source: TH