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Archive 1Archive 2Archive 3Archive 4

So the question is...

If Helium is as abundant as it sounds... than how much in density/volume mass does it occur in the average in space? If you can answer this... please do!

If you mean the universe, probably a similar ratio as there are stars to the volume of space (I don't know). It is not found floating around in empty space though, mostly just in stars. (Do you think this should be clarified in the article?) —Centrx→talk • 16:37, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
For the whole universe, the average is one atom of helium per 64 cubic centimeters of space. For hydrogen, about 1 atom in 4 cc. SBHarris 04:53, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Extraction and use doesn't have enough information

The Extraction and Use section reads more like a "History of Helium" chapter. More information is needed on how helium is obtained, whether all of it comes from the ground or if other methods can be used to obtain it, and so forth. -Rolypolyman 21:44, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

The "Extraction and Use" section is a subsection of "History", that is, it is about the "History of Helium". The information you seek is available in the "Extraction" section under "Occurrence and Production". A renaming of the section headers may be warranted, or a see also. —Centrx→talk • 01:51, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Lung Collapse

Helium may also cause Lung Collapse--68.207.206.69 02:57, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

The statement in the cited article: "BLM disclaimer: Inhaling helium is not a good idea. Because helium is less dense than air, inhaling it creates the potential for collapsed lungs. Really.", seems like it was made as a twisted scary statement to ward laypersons off from trying it. The article's focus isn't on the dangers, it's a press release on the supply of helium. Atropos235 05:44, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Crystal structure of helium

I'm not positive about this, but according to Web Elements’ helium crystal page, helium typically has a face-centered cubic structure. This is the same structure as the Kepler conjecture and forms the pyramid of cannonballs shown here. From what I can gather by googling on the subject, the body-centered cubic structure is a special, extra-high pressure form. I hope someone looks into this and makes the necessary corrections. As I am not expert in these matters — and don't desire to be — I hope someone who knows for sure will post a comment here. If no one ever bothers to comment, and the current two cyrstal structures stay (“hexagonal or bcc”), then after a week or so, I may change it to “FCC and BCC” (and then catch hell). Greg L 01:59, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

  • Well, no one stepped up to the plate and addressed this so far. But here's what I've found: In accordance with Web Elements’ helium crystal page,, cubic-closest packing is the crystal form favored by the inert gases. This is because the van der Waals forces between these atoms have highly isotropic interactions so each atom prefers to have maximum contact with neighbors. Due to its extremely weak heat of fusion (only 21 mJ mol−1), helium does not freeze — even at absolute zero — at room pressure and must be under 25 bar of pressure to crystallize. But when it finally does so, it assumes the thermodynamically most favored crystal structure: cubic closest-packing. In cubic closest-packing, a given atom is in contact with the maximum possible number of neighbors: 12 (6 in the same plane, 3 above the plane, and 3 below the plane). As such for sphere packing, it has the mathematically maximum efficiency of 74%.

    I've further found that there are two patterns for closest-packed: hexagonal closest packing (HCP) as well as “face-centered cubic” (FCC). I see that metals such as most of the platinum-group metals plus gold and silver crystallize in a cubic closest-packed structure. And not surprisingly, the crystal form of silver and gold actually found in the field is the octahedron (which is one of the repeating crystalline forms of the FCC unit cell). Since all the other noble gases are FCC, and since Web Elements also says that helium is fcc, I’ve changed the article accordingly. I've dropped "body-centered cubic" so it now says "fcc and hexagonal". Greg L 18:48, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
  • I've researched more into the crystal structure of helium. D. G. Henshaw at the Chalk River Laboratories in Ontario did neutron defraction experiments in 1957 and determined helium has a hexagonal close-packed structure (Structure of Solid Helium by Neutron Diffraction, Physical Review Letters 109, Pg. 328 - 330 [Issue 2 – January 1958]) (abstract). Accordingly, I believe Web Elements’ helium crystal page is likely incorrect and they just chose the wrong illustration for the crystal sturcture. I've reverted the cyrstal structure back to simply "hexagonal close-packed". What I was really looking for was information on the density of solid helium. I've added this information to the article too (difference). Greg L 21:29, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

The helium electron energy levels?

I couldn't find the helium electron energy levels in this article. Is there a standard space for them that i missed, in the Template:Elementbox or any other template? I found a website [1] that give the first five levels for standard He 2 4 as -54,4 eV, -13,6, -6,04, -3,4, -2,176. Maybe this can be added to the article.--JR, 12:46, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

precautions clarification request

in the precautions section, it is written "Containers of helium gas at 5 to 10 K should be handled...". Could somebody please clarify what the "K" means? I'm guessing it stands for kilo (k), but what are the actual units? 5 to 10k what? Is this pressure?

An important clue to the meaning is the latter part of that same sentence you're reading, "...helium gas at less than 10 K is warmed to room temperature", which prettly clearly indicates that "10 K" is some below-room-temp temperature. The unit "K" is used conistently throughout the article to mean (and often linked to) the Kelvin temperature scale. DMacks 19:33, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
That makes a lot of sense. Thanks. (<-shaking morning cruft out of head)

"very nearly inert"

Helium (He) is a colorless, odorless, tasteless, non-toxic, nearly inert monatomic chemical element

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't He the most completely inert element? The rest of the noble gases are also inert, but the heavier they are the easier it is to coax them into compounds. Helium is the lightest and has only the first shell filled, thus is the least reactive element in the universe.

My point is that it's a little odd to call the least reactive element in the universe "nearly inert". By any sane measure, it IS inert. If we can't call helium inert (because of the existence of few rare unstable compounds), we can't call *anything* inert and we might as well ditch the word. --Lode Runner 10:25, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Escape From Atmosphere

Creationist web sites such as this make the claim that "the amount of helium in the earth’s atmosphere indicates a young earth". It would be nice to get some information in this article about the escape rate of helium so that I have a place to redirect my creationist "friends" when they claim such nonsense.

Right now, the article merely says "an estimated 3.4 litres of helium per year are generated per cubic kilometer of the Earth's crust" and "the concentration of helium by volume is only 5.2 parts per million, largely because most helium in the Earth's atmosphere escapes into space due to its inertness and low mass", but neither of these claims is sourced.

If anybody knows this information, please add it. I would like to see the "Natural abundance" section expanded and made bulletproof. Bueller 007 09:51, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I just shuffled it around a bit. I found a whole wiki article about atmospheric escape and linked it there. Googling led me to this Science article, and especially footnotes 11, 12, 13 look relevant. I don't have access to those cited journals right now. A gentler introduction might be this web page. Whenever I'm confronted by creationist claims, I head over to TalkOrigins Archive to debunk them. They have a page debunking the helium claim, and its source happens to be the same as the Science footnote #12, so I think that's a good ref for loss (which apparently isn't solely due to low mass ("it's light so it floats up and out"). DMacks 14:56, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the reply. I'm aware of all the talk-origins resources (I always go there first) but I find that t-o tends to go over the heads of creationists. For example, this is a reply to the creationist claim I mentioned above. [2] Good luck getting a creationist to sift through that. If it could all be boiled down to a couple of salient points for the Wiki article, it would be much more effective (and improve the Wiki'd knowledge about helium escape.) Bueller 007 15:42, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, it's a shame that science is verbose and technical, one of the appeals of "simple" (though wrong or incomplete or mis-generalized) statements. The abstract of the Lie-Svendsen & Rees article is a pretty layman's worded description of their conclusions. DMacks 15:49, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Shortest lived isotope ambiguity

At present, the article claims "The shortest-lived isotope is helium-5 with a half-life of 7.6×10−22 second." Does this refer to the shortest lived of all isotopes? Or just the shortest lived of the helium isotopes? Stifynsemons 13:40, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Answer: The article Isotopes of lithium has somewhat shorter half-lives for both lithium-4 and lithium-5. I will change the sentence you quote to read "The shortest-lived helium isotope ..." Dirac66 17:31, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Note to user 141.52.232.84 When a link has been re-directed, please do not just revert without checking that the old link is still correct. In this case, the link for the buoyancy calculation (He vs. H2) was formerly directed to Airship where this calculation used to be. However several editors of Airship suggested that the calculation really belongs in Lighter than air, including one who deleted it from Airship a few days ago. Yesterday I reinserted the buoyancy calculation in Lighter than air as per these suggestions, and then I redirected the link in this (Helium) article so that it links to Lighter than air which is the new location of the calculation.

I am therefore reverting your edit to restore the new link. Apparently my first edit summary did not make the reason clear in the limited space allowed, so I am putting this longer explanation on the talk page. Please leave the new link alone now. Thank you. Dirac66 17:27, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

just wondering

isn't helium created by the splitting of a hydrogen atom , as opposed to fusion . —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.53.125.49 (talk) 22:12, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

So, obviously, a hydrogen nucleus has two protons, and two electrons. Actually, it would have more than that, because it'd need to be split. Answer to your question: No. Pifreak94 (talk) 05:55, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

he —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.144.180.195 (talk) 15:18, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Janssen did not discover helium

Although a great many sources claim that French astronomer Pierre Jules César Janssen observed the spectral D3 line of helium during the solar eclipse of 18 August 1895, those claims are false.

Both a French scholar (Françoise Launay) and an American author (Wheeler Sears) have investigated this claim and found no evidence that Janssen either recognized the D3 spectral line or suggested that that spectral line revealed the presence of a new element. See:

  • Françoise Launay with Storm Dunlop, trans., The Astronomer Jules Janssen: A Globetrotter of Celestial Physics (Heidelberg, Germany: Springer, 2012), p. 45.
  • Wheeler M. Sears, Helium: The Disappearing Element (Heidelberg, Germany: Springer, 2015), p. 44.

The communication in which Janssen presented, to the French Academy of Sciences, his findings of the 18 August 1868 solar eclipse is:

In order to eliminate any doubt whatsoever that Janssen did not mention the D3 line of helium in that communication, here is my translation of it:

"Physical Astronomy — Information on some of the results obtained at Cocanada, during the eclipse of the month of last August, and following that eclipse. Letter from Mr. Janssen to the perpetual Secretary.

Cocanada, 19 September 1868.

At this moment I'm at Guntoor, my observation station for the eclipse, and I'm benefiting from the imminent departure of the post in order to give the Academy news of my mission, which it has done me the honor of conferring on me.

I lack the time to send a detailed report; I will have the honor of doing that by the next post. For now, I will merely summarize the main results obtained.

The Guntoor station was undoubtedly the most favorable: the sky was fine, especially during totality, and my powerful telescopes with a focus of almost 3-meters allowed me to pursue the analytical study of all the phenomena of the eclipse.

Immediately after totality, two magnificent protuberances appeared; one of them, more than 3 minutes in height, shone with a splendor that is difficult to imagine. The analysis of its light showed me immediately that it was formed by an immense column of incandescent gas, mainly composed of hydrogen gas.

The analysis of the circumsolar regions, where Mr. Kirchoff locates the solar atmosphere, did not produce results consistent with the theory formulated by this illustrious physicist; these results, it seems to me, should lead to a knowledge of the true constitution of the solar spectrum.

But the most important result of these observations is the discovery of a method, whose principle was conceived during the same eclipse, and which permits the study of the protuberances and of the circumsolar regions at all times, without its being necessary to resort to the interposition of an opaque body in front of the disc of the Sun. This method is based on the spectral properties of the protuberances' light, light which is resolved into a small number of very bright beams, corresponding to the dark rays of the solar spectrum.

The day after the eclipse, the method was applied with success, and I could see phenomena presented by a new eclipse which lasted all day. The protuberances of the previous day were profoundly changed. There remained hardly any traces of the great protuberances, and the distribution of gaseous material was quite different.

Since that day, until October 4th, I have constantly studied the Sun in this regard. I have drafted images of the protuberances, which show with what rapidity (often in [only] some minutes) these immense gaseous masses are deformed and are moved. Finally, during this period, which has been like an eclipse of 17 days, I collected a great number of facts, which revealed themselves, on the physical constitution of the Sun.

I am pleased to offer these results to the Academy and to the Bureau of Longitude, in order to repay the confidence that has been shown me and the honor that has been done me by confiding to me this important mission."

Since Janssen did not mention the D3 line and did not state that he had found a new element — and since two independent authors (Launay and Sears) agree with that conclusion — I propose to delete from this article the claim that Janssen discovered helium.

VexorAbVikipædia (talk) 18:06, 1 May 2017 (UTC)

You can't use the lack of information in your source to prove a negative. The two sources already in the article make it clear that Janssen had discovered the D3 line and recognised that the element was not sodium.
From http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1991JBAA..101...95K&link_type=ARTICLE&db_key=AST&high=
  • "Janssen made a significant discovery. The yellow line which everybody had mistakenly thought to be that of sodium had to belong to some other element."
From https://books.google.co.uk/books?redir_esc=y&id=Yhi5X7OwuGkC&q=Janssen#v=snippet&q=Janssen&f=false
  • "When he observed a line in the corona spectrum at a wavelength of 587.49 nanometres, he knew that a hitherto unknown element was present."
If you feel that the conjectures of Launay and Sears are sufficiently well accepted in the mainstream to be worth mentioning in the article, then by all means propose some text that you believe should be included. I don't think, though, that there is any case for deleting the claim that Janssen discovered helium as it's simply too well attested in so many sources, a a quick Google search will show you. --RexxS (talk) 21:32, 1 May 2017 (UTC)
From what I understand and remember, Janssen was the first to see the line, while Lockyer was the first to recognise it as belonging to a new element. (And then later began yet another craze of finding nonexistent new elements, some of which turned out to be interesting highly charged ions.) Given the tremendous variety found in element discoveries, I do not think a one-size-fits-all measure of priority would do justice to the situation; as I think the IUPAP/IUPAC TWG remarked, an absolute priority would often equate to an absolute injustice. No, far better would be to go with the discoverers reliable sources state, and then state their respective contributions, at least IMHO. Double sharp (talk) 22:57, 1 May 2017 (UTC)
Yes, I can indeed use a lack of information to prove a negative. If "Double sharp" claimed that he had discovered helium, I would ask him, "Where is the evidence?" "Double sharp" can't answer, "Although there is no evidence that I discovered helium, lots of people say otherwise." Sorry, but you must provide evidence that Janssen observed the D3 line. As Janssen's own communication reveals, he didn't provide any such evidence. You say that many, many sources say that he did observe it, and that's correct. But if you actually examine those sources (as I have), you will make a shocking discovery: not a single one of them provides a citation showing exactly where Janssen stated that he'd observed the D3 line. Not one source provides a citation. None. Because none exists.
I should add that I've encountered this situation before. In Wikipedia's article on "glasses" (eyeglasses), many, many sources stated that "Salvino D'Armati" invented eyeglasses. There's even a bust of him in an Italian church, proclaiming him as the inventor of eyeglasses. I found references that revealed "Salvino D'Armati" as a fiction, a hoax. Vast numbers of references were wrong. Similarly, in thermodynamics there's a result that's called the "Gibbs–Thomson equation". There's even a Wikipedia article on it. I checked to determine where Gibbs or Thomson had stated the equation. They hadn't. The equation was derived independently by an Austrian physicist (Ries) and a German physical chemist (Meissner). The equation is named after people who didn't discover it. So, is it possible for everyone else to be wrong? Yes, it's happened to me before. In fact, it's quite common. Professor X sends his grad' student to do historical research in the library. The student copies what he finds in books and papers, without checking original sources. So the errors of the previous generation are propagated into the next generation. I have found cases (e.g., in the case of the discovery of the sugar lactose) where errors were propagated for almost 300 years.
Do what I did: check any of those sources that claim that Janssen observed the D3 line, and look for a citation from Janssen's works. You won't find any such citation because it doesn't exist. VexorAbVikipædia (talk) 00:38, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
You will also find the interesting thing that even Lockyer was not so sure that he had found a new element: he only used the word "helium" once in his scientific papers, and speculated that the Fraunhofer D3 line might be due to hydrogen instead: see John Hearnshaw's Astronomical Spectrographs and Their History, p. 98. Not until Ramsay's isolation of terrestrial helium and his demonstration that the D3 line occurs in its spectrum was everything cleared up and the name of helium popularised. If one insists on assigning discovery Z by Z, clearly only Ramsay satisfies the criteria: he alone was sure that he had discovered a new element and was right. But clearly he could not have done this without Lockyer's earlier work following Janssen's technique, and even if they either failed to claim the new element (Janssen) or did so unconvincingly and in an unconvinced manner (Lockyer), their contributions should be noted and put into perspective. FWIW, I would support listing Ramsay as discoverer with the usual historical narrative mentioned and analysed following your account of research into the matter by reliable sources. Double sharp (talk) 00:58, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
@VexorAbVikipædia: Actually, you really can't use a lack of evidence to prove a negative. But more importantly I don't have to prove jack-shit. The sources are there which say Janssen discovered helium. You could ask all the authors of the sources "where's your proof?", but you haven't. Nobody cares how many times you've encountered this situation. You don't get to do your amateur analysis of sources and decide that they are wrong. Feel free to get your research published in a good quality journal and then we can take a look at it. In the meantime whatever errors might or might not exist in sources matters not one jot. We have the sources that say something and that's what we report. If you want to suggest additional text based on what Launay and Sears believe, feel free to suggest some wording, otherwise, please don't waste other editors' time here – Wikipedia isn't a place to publish your own research. --RexxS (talk) 01:36, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
Yes, Double sharp's statements about Lockyer are true: they can be substantiated by references to his own work. However, the claims about Janssen can't be substantiated by references to his own work. No one ever provides a citation of his work to show that he observed the D3 line. In reply to RexxS, I have cited at least 2 sources that state that Janssen didn't discover helium or even distinguish its D3 line. How many sources are required to refute a large number of erroneous sources? What qualifies as refutation? To argue that "whatever errors might or might not exist in sources matters not one jot. We have the sources that say something and that's what we report." is frankly frightening. It means that evidence isn't necessary for something to be "true"; rather, the "truth" is whatever is the majority's opinion, even if the majority has no evidence to substantiate that opinion. If a majority of physicists believe that electromagnetic waves propagate through the ether, then that must be true — because the majority believes it to be true.
In this article, the work of Lockyer and Palmieri can legitimately cited because it can be documented that they observed actual, physical evidence of helium; namely, a spectral line that couldn't be attributed to any other known element. Janssen didn't do that. As Sears showed, other observers at the time did notice what appears to have been the D3 line. They therefore deserve more recognition than Janssen.
Would the administrators of Wikipedia at least allow me to mention that there's a dispute about whether Janssen discovered helium? Or that others observed what appears to have been the D3 line? VexorAbVikipædia (talk) 02:41, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
I would think that a few detailed sources that specifically study the matter at hand should outweigh many other less detailed ones that just throw in the discoverers: see actinium for instance, in another case where the usually acknowledged discoverer did not discover the element. I think it would be perfectly fine to say that Janssen did not actually see the line, even though he is usually credited; his place can of course be stated without calling him the discoverer. Lockyer's contribution should also be somewhat tempered by his lack of certainty about his new element. I understand where RexxS is coming from, because Wikipedia has to work on verifiability, but in this case the truth is verifiable and easily cited by primary and secondary sources, as you have demonstrated. Double sharp (talk) 05:19, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
I've already asked you to suggest some wording to incorporate those two sources, but you seem to want to ignore that. Here are eight sources that say Janssen discovered helium:
How many sources are required to rebut two dissenting sources? Who gave you the authority to decide that your two sources are correct and all the others are erroneous? To answer your questions: refutation of a fringe view occurs when the vast majority of mainstream sources disagree with the fringe view. As for your other concern, I don't care what frankly frightens you. Wikipedia has a fundamental policy, Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, "which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic." That policy requires us not to take sides when two views disagree. So in response to Double sharp: no, VexorAbVikipædia has not demonstrated the Truth™, and we are in no position to arbitrate between differing claims. We simply have to report them. --RexxS (talk) 11:34, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
Well, I'm sorry to say that I have to slightly disagree with you on this one. Let's consider the discovery of actinium for instance, which is a similar case that I wrote on before on WP. Many, many sources talking about the elements in general, or perhaps even simply just reviewing the chemistries of the elements in general, will perfunctorily state that Debierne discovered Ac in 1899. And yet, if you look at sources that are actually focused on the discovery of actinium, you will see something quite different, for instance in this review by H. W. Kirby, repeated in his co-written chapter on Ac in The Chemistry of the Actinide and Transactinide Elements. I do not see why Kirby's carefully conducted research here should be outweighed by the multitude of sources parroting each other without properly looking up the details of discovery, which tend not to interest the scientists very much: they would rather do new work. The only exception I can think of where the majority of scientists were interested in reanalysing the historical record was for lutetium (which even got Niels Bohr involved), but was only because it was directly related to the then new controversy over who discovered the next element hafnium: the major crux in the discovery of element 72 was the purity of the supposed samples of element 71. As such, Actinium#History presents a balanced view of the subject: it notes that "Debierne...is now considered by the vast majority of historians as the discoverer", while it notes the problems with his results pointed out by Kirby, and credits Giesel's contribution while stopping short of crediting him as the discoverer.
The same is true for helium. For sure, many sources will say that Janssen was one of the discoverers of helium. But are they focused on the discovery of helium, or is that just one little entry that they need to get over with before going to their main focus, or just one little thing in a brief summary? And if that is the case, which certainly seems so with all your sources, why shouldn't detailed historical studies like those of Launay and Sears outweigh them? As such I would propose the following change: instead of saying "The line was detected by French astronomer Jules Janssen during a total solar eclipse in Guntur, India", it would be better to say that "It is often reported that the line was detected by French astronomer Jules Janssen during a total solar eclipse in Guntur, India, but detailed investigation of this claim by Françoise Launay and Wheeler Sears found no evidence that Janssen either recognized the D3 spectral line or suggested that that spectral line revealed the presence of a new element." Then the first clear date can be moved from 18 August (Janssen's non-discovery) to 20 October (Lockyer's), simultaneously acknowledging what the majority says while noting that detailed studies have noted that it is an error. So that would be a compromise saying that while most sources report that Janssen discovered He, some detailed examinations suggest that he probably didn't; how does that sound? Double sharp (talk) 11:52, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
It seems that both I and Wikipedia policy have to disagree with you. We have no mandate per WP:WEIGHT to decide which sources are right and which are wrong. This is what that policy says:
Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources. <ref>The relative prominence of each viewpoint among Wikipedia editors or the general public is not relevant and should not be considered.</ref>
I don't think it can be any clearer than that. How about "The first evidence of helium was observed on August 18, 1868, as a bright yellow line with a wavelength of 587.49 nanometers in the spectrum of the chromosphere of the Sun. The line was detected by French astronomer Jules Janssen during a total solar eclipse in Guntur, India." referenced to any number of sources. I don't think there's any doubt that the first evidence was observed by Janssen (perhaps among others, but that's what the sources say). That could be followed by mention of the recent historical revisionism of Launay and Sears: "Recent historical studies suggest that Janssen did not claim the discovery of helium when reporting his observations." How does that sound? --RexxS (talk) 12:54, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
On the contrary, there is doubt that the first evidence was observed by Janssen at all. The recent historical studies (although I would hesitate to use the rather negatively charged word "revisionism" on them) suggest that Janssen did not see the D3 line, at least at first.
In fact, it seems that the crediting of Janssen as the discoverer of helium is the actual revisionism: if it was readily accepted, one would have thought that such an amazing achievement would have been reflected in his obituary. No, on the contrary, what he is credited for in the eclipse of 1868 is the technique for observing the prominence spectrum of the Sun, which Lockyer also independently invented at about the same time. They appeared as codiscoverers on the medal for this work, not for the discovery of helium: perhaps the confusion came from there, as only Lockyer claimed the new element, and that only somewhat half-heartedly until Ramsay isolated it on Earth.
I will note that Greenwood and Earnshaw, that great comprehensive inorganic chemistry tome, appear to have done their research: "During the solar eclipse of 18 August 1868, a new yellow line was observed close to the sodium D lines in the spectrum of the sun's chromosphere. This led J. N. Lockyer (founder in 1869 of the journal Nature) and E. Frankland to suggest the existence of a new element which, appropriately, they named helium (Greek ἤλιος, the sun). The same line was observed by L. Palmieri in 1881 in the spectrum of volcanic gas from Mount Vesuvius, and the terrestrial existence of helium was finally confirmed by W. Rmasay in the course of his intensive study of atmospheric gases which led to the recognition of a new group in the periodic table." So, now we have a third source, whose main goal is not historical revisionism. Double sharp (talk) 14:23, 2 May 2017 (UTC)

Hi, what would suffice to refute 2 dissident sources? A direct quote from a paper by Janssen in which he states something like: "While I was observing the eclipse of 1868, I noticed a yellow line near the Fraunhofer D lines." No one has provided such a quote. So there is no evidence that Janssen observed the D3 line of helium. Direct quotes can be provided for claims that the D3 line of helium was observed in 1868 by Georges Rayet, Captain C.T. Haig, Norman Pogson, and Lieutenant John Herschel. See (Sears, 2015), pp. 43-44. So, I will try to follow Double sharp's suggestions. However, I am aware that this is a featured article and no one (including me) wants to endanger that status. So any changes that I make, will be as restrained as possible. I will mention an unpublished letter from Janssen in which he mentions the Fraunhofer D line, so perhaps that will address the concerns of RexxS. I am interested in the truth, not in desecrating Wikipedia articles. VexorAbVikipædia (talk) 14:05, 2 May 2017 (UTC)

It seems that we have two separate consensuses among sources. Most sources that do not focus on the history of helium simply parrot the line that Janssen and Lockyer both discovered helium. On the other hand, every single source either of us have found focusing on this history agrees with what VexorAbVikipædia has stated, that only Lockyer had the courage to posit that a new element had been discovered. The Story of Helium and the Birth of Astrophysics by Biman B. Nath is particularly clear here: (p. 176) 'While Janssen was more preoccupied with the physical interpretation of the red flame phenomena, what seemed to have caught Lockyer's attention later was a remark in a report (probably Pogson's) that a yellow line might have been seen not wholly coincident with the position of the sodium D line. / It is not clear now how Pogson's name got mixed up in his mind with Janssen's name. He must have been impressed by Janssen's report of the bright line spectrum, because it was Janssen's name that stuck in his mind. What he seemed to have been remembered [sic] as a summary of the reports was that Janssen had seen a yellow line where it was not supposed be [sic]. Of course, Janssen never reported it, but Lockyer thought Janssen did. It was much later—after an unfortunate tussle with his erstwhile friend Huggins–that Lockyer would realize the comment was from Pogson's report and not Janssen's.' (emphasis mine)
Janssen was only convinced about the separateness of the new line from those of sodium in December 1868, asking Charles Sainte-Claire Deville (p. 181) 'to notify the Academy of Sciences of a passage from his (unpublished) letter of December 19: "Several observers have claimed the bright line D as forming part of the spectrum of the prominences on 18th August. The bright yellow line did indeed lie very close to D, but the light was more refrangible than those of the D lines. My subsequent studies of the Sun have shown the accuracy of what I state here."' So he only claims he saw it after others did – sounds exactly like the later actinium issue with Debierne and Giesel! In any case, most reliable sources seriously studying the matter give Lockyer credit for helium, and I daresay they represent more significant viewpoints than those of sources which do not seriously study the matter. Double sharp (talk) 15:02, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
And when I see what looks like the only serious source giving Janssen some credit at all, it proceeds to immediately give it right back. The Synthesis of the Elements: The Astrophysical Quest for Nucleosynthesis and What It Can Tell Us About the Universe (Giora Shaviv, 2012, p. 43) states in the main text "An independent discovery [of helium] was made the same year by Pierre Janssen", and then gives it right back with the footnote: "The names Janssen and Lockyer appear together because they independently devised a method to see the corona in broad daylight without the need for an eclipse. Janssen described the spectra, but the courageous hypothesis about a new element is due to Lockyer. Janssen was too enthusiastic about the new instrument to be bothered by an unidentified new element." Not a single reliable source specifically taking history as its main focus gives Janssen as much credit as Lockyer, and most do not give him credit for helium at all. Double sharp (talk) 15:09, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
I've given you eight reliable sources above. Are you trying to tell me that "Nature's Building Blocks: An A-Z Guide to the Elements By John Emsley" isn't a serious source? or Encyclopedia Britannica? or the Royal Society of Chemistry? or any other the others? Which ones are not serious sources? Even the source you adduce, Shaviv (2012), is clear that "An independent discovery [of helium] was made the same year by Pierre Janssen" and you've quoted it. There are no grounds whatsoever for removing the present text describing Janssen's first observation of the D3 line, which he recognised as at a shorter wavelength than the D lines of sodium – as he states in his letter of December 1868 and you quoted! The history of science contains many examples of discoveries where the nature of the discovery was not immediately recognised, but that in no way diminishes the achievement of the discoverer. All of the sources tell us that Janssen spotted the yellow line in 1868, and that he realised it was not sodium. That's enough to support our present text – and I'll remind you that this article has undergone peer review and the Featured Article candidature, so its content has not passed unexamined. --RexxS (talk) 16:08, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
@RexxS:, I believe that when Double sharp says "serious source" at the beginning of his paragraph above, he means "reliable source specifically taking history as its main focus" as he says at the end of his paragraph. @Double sharp: Please correct me if I am wrong. YBG (talk) 18:35, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
YBG is exactly right here. The nature of general treatments is that they tend not to do enough of their own original research and simply parrot unquestioningly what others have said; when their own original research is done, it is often wrong. As for Nature's Building Blocks, there are enough howlers in it (conspiracy explanation for flooding with silver salts! supposed natural transplutoniums, mathematically impossible with the neutron flux on Earth today) that yes, I am saying that these are not serious sources for the discovery. And meanwhile the RSC site hilariously uses predictions of metallicity for the superheavies, and copy-and-pastes it one too many times even though every serious source speculates that element 118 would be nonmetallic. These sources are just not as good as detailed treatments of the statement being cited would be and should be outweighed by them. And even that one mention from Shaviv is heavily tempered by the footnote.
If someone had found evidence of a new element, but had not pursued it further and not claimed it, would it be reasonable to call him the discoverer? No, of course not, and that according to the IUPAC's own principles for adjucating new element discoveries. So why does it suddenly become different here? Just because a host of sources not focusing on the matter and sloppily copying each other say the same thing? If one is citing a statement, isn't it much better to find a source that painstakingly researches the statement in question, rather than a popularised treatment which simply gives the information matter-of-factly with neither clear citations nor any research at all? Double sharp (talk) 22:53, 2 May 2017 (UTC) I have struck out the part of my comment concerning the metallicity of the superheavy elements, as I have since found out that there is a serious possibility that oganesson might have some metallic properties, and that the RSC site has not exactly copied and pasted this description for all the superheavies; copernicium is there speculated to behave closer to the noble gases than to metals. I apologise for the error. Double sharp (talk) 16:08, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
@Double sharp: I think those points are the nub of the argument. The problem with saying that we're going to use source A and ignore source B because we think the methodology of source A is better than that of source B is that we're not qualified to make that judgement – and Wikipedia policies back that up. Here's what Wikipedia:Neutral point of view says: "Achieving what the Wikipedia community understands as neutrality means carefully and critically analyzing a variety of reliable sources and then attempting to convey to the reader the information contained in them fairly, proportionately, and as far as possible without editorial bias. Wikipedia aims to describe disputes, but not engage in them. Editors, while naturally having their own points of view, should strive in good faith to provide complete information, and not to promote one particular point of view over another. As such, the neutral point of view does not mean exclusion of certain points of view, but including all verifiable points of view which have sufficient due weight." I disagree with discarding (for example) Encyclopedia Britannica's view that "Helium was discovered in the gaseous atmosphere surrounding the Sun by the French astronomer Pierre Janssen" because you believe the authors "simply parrot unquestioningly what others have said". You have no evidence of what process those authors went through to reach their conclusions. Similarly, you simply can't reject the Royal Society of Chemistry's views because you disagree with them. I don't accept that our policy on WP:WEIGHT gives you carte blanche to reject reliable sources because they are "not as good". The only criterion for WEIGHT is the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources, not an editor's assessment of how good a source is.
As for the hypothetical someone who "had found evidence of a new element, but had not pursued it further and not claimed it", can I ask you to please read what our article actually says: "The first evidence of helium was observed on August 18, 1868, as a bright yellow line with a wavelength of 587.49 nanometers in the spectrum of the chromosphere of the Sun. The line was detected by French astronomer Jules Janssen during a total solar eclipse in Guntur, India. Our article quite carefully does not name Janssen as "the discoverer of helium", but as the person who observed the first evidence. I just don't understand why we would want to remove the description of his achievement that's been present in this article for the last ten years, although I can see the value in adding a sentence pointing out that modern studies indicate that he didn't make a claim to be the discoverer of a new element. --RexxS (talk) 16:24, 3 May 2017 (UTC)
He was not even the only one to observe this new evidence and not consider the possibility of a new element (note the quote earlier about Pogson); so why only single out him? At best we should say that while he is often given credit as a co-discoverer, modern reexaminations of the historical matter show that he did not claim the new element, and only claimed to see the new yellow line after others had already found it (and in response to your question about whether I read what the article says, perhaps you should reread the quotes from the reliable sources I provided). I too am not proposing that we remove this in the article, but rather that we should add this detail; only in the infobox, where there is not space to go into all this, would it make sense to credit discovery to Lockyer alone as many well-researched sources actually do. I'm not saying the RSC is unreliable, but surely we would prefer a source that is actually focused on what it is citing to a source that just states it matter-of-factly in one sentence and then never follows it up again. Double sharp (talk) 22:58, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

Separate article for Helium shortage?

Perhaps helium shortage deserves to be its own article? It is a temporal issue separate from the timeless nature of the element itself. It has been in scientific news for some time. Tayste (edits) 01:39, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I think there may be enough for a subarticle here. I would also note that the oversupply of helium is somewhat of an American thing, because most sources are located there. Elsewhere, the problem was already bad enough in the 1980s that Greenwood and Earnshaw wrote that outside the USA, argon was almost always used when helium was not absolutely indispensable. Double sharp (talk) 14:49, 2 November 2016 (UTC)
We have created a page close to this topic: http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Helium_storage_and_conservation. Maybe it would be of interest to link to this page.J. A. Buitendijk (talk) 17:09, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Units

In a recent edit summary, someone mentioned imperial units. US chemical engineering is commonly done in English (not imperial) units, such as cubic feet and pounds (mass). I am not sure of the sizes, and gas cylinder doesn't seem to help much, but I suspect that they are commonly in cubic feet. Also, for non-liquifying gases, the contents of cylinders are commonly (in the US) in cubic feet at (standard) atmospheric pressure. Gah4 (talk) 18:00, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

Chemical element articles use SI units all over. Exceptions (like: from old sources) may occur. For sure, we won't go into differences between those US end EN 'imperial' units. -DePiep (talk) 19:53, 6 July 2017 (UTC)
All I was trying to say, is that I suspect that gas cylinder sizes are commonly in cubic feet. That is, that they are specified to make nice round numbers in cubic feet, which may be not so round in cubic meters. This doesn't have much to do with the element, but more with they way things are packaged. That is, marketing but not science. Gah4 (talk) 22:36, 6 July 2017 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Many sources use 'billions of cubic feet' when describing helium reserves - see http://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2016-06-28-huge-helium-discovery-life-saving-find for a recent example from an impeccable source. It's up to us to provide sensible conversions into multiple common units so that readers who are accustomed to different systems can make sense of what we are writing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Pkq_eBHXJ4?t=1m1s --RexxS (talk) 22:47, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

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Semi-protected edit request on 9 October 2017

Change 'Greek god' to 'Greek titan'. Pedantic, I know, but hey. 86.143.64.252 (talk) 16:20, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

 Done. -- Ed (Edgar181) 16:30, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 9 November 2017

CHANGE believed to theorised.

i.e This helium-4 binding energy also accounts for why it is a product of both nuclear fusion and radioactive decay. Most helium in the universe is helium-4, and is believed(change to theorised) to have been formed during the Big Bang. Large amounts of new helium are being created by nuclear fusion of hydrogen in stars. Evmcbeth (talk) 07:24, 9 November 2017 (UTC)

Interesting. I wouldn't have though about this if you hadn't mentioned it, and now I am not so sure. How about widely believed? Even more, the suggestion of the sentence is that all of the 4
2He
 was produced in the big bang, when that is obviously not true. I presume, then, that the theory says most. Do you have a reference for the theory? Gah4 (talk) 08:08, 9 November 2017 (UTC)
Question: @Evmcbeth: Why do you think such is necessary? And do you any source which have it like that? It seems you're thinking of "believe" within its "very narrow" definition.  — Ammarpad (talk) 02:18, 10 November 2017 (UTC)
Yes, believed means believed by scientists (theorists) interested in the subject. On the other hand, the description seems to say that all is from the big bang, which is wrong. Gah4 (talk) 08:58, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

The lead summarises the body of the text, in this case "The vast majority of helium was formed by Big Bang nucleosynthesis one to three minutes after the Big Bang." from Helium #Natural abundance. This is mainstream, accepted scientific fact and should not be qualified as 'belief' as if there were some doubt, but stated as fact in Wikipedia's voice. If required, an easily accessible source for the conclusion can be found at:

  • "Hydrogen and Helium". StarDate Online. The University of Texas McDonald Observatory. Retrieved 10 November 2017.

I've amended the lead to match the section. --RexxS (talk) 13:13, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 17 November 2017

The following part of a sentence in the "Occurence and production" section is somewhat incorrect: "As of 2011 the world's helium reserves were estimated at 40 billion cubic meters". The word "world" is confusing and can mean the Earth as well as our universe, depending on the background of the reader - as a scientist I personally associate the "world" as the "universe". It should be changed to "As of 2011 the Earth's helium reserves were estimated at 40 billion cubic meters". HydroxyPCP (talk) 12:33, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

You do know you're the only person in the world who thinks "the world" means anything other than "the Earth", don't you? Wikipedia is written for a general, lay audience, for whom the phrase holds no confusion. --RexxS (talk) 15:17, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 28 November 2017

{in Image side Helium is a p block element but below the image display this is s block element} 1.22.221.159 (talk) 12:35, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Helium is, by definition, an s-block element, because its valence electrons are in the s-orbital (like hydrogen, sodium, calcium, etc.), but chemically it is clearly a noble gas like the other group 18 elements. So the infobox periodic table correctly places He in group 18, although the infobox later correctly identifies He as an s-block element. There is some relevant discussion at Block (periodic table) #s-block et seq. On that page the table shows elements coloured by block, whereas the table used in this article's infobox shows elements coloured by group. I don't believe there is any contradiction in that, nor that any amendment to the article is necessary. --RexxS (talk) 13:13, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 29 January 2018

"Helium-3 is present on Earth only in trace amounts; most of it since Earth's formation, though some falls to Earth trapped in cosmic dust."

Please add {{huh}} after the comma, since this doesn't make sense; it has no verb. 208.95.51.38 (talk) 14:54, 29 January 2018 (UTC) 208.95.51.38 (talk) 14:54, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

I have adjusted the wording for clarity. -- Ed (Edgar181) 15:00, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
Thank you. 208.95.51.38 (talk) 21:11, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

New York criminal court citation

This article was cited twice (without versioning) by Judge Matthew A. Sciarrino, Jr. of the NYC Criminal Court in Manhattan (New York County) to support the proposition that helium is a "noxious material" in denying the dismissal of misdemeanor criminal charges against three men selling helium balloons of "unlawfully possessing or selling noxious material" (New York Penal Law § 270.05).

Helium is defined as a colorless, odorless, tasteless, nontoxic, inert monatomic gas that heads the noble gas group in the periodic table. (See Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, Helium, available at http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Helium.) Although "neutral helium at standard conditions" should not pose a health risk, excessive inhalation of the gas can cause asphyxiation. (See New World Encyclopedia, Helium, available at http://newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Helium.)
People will sometimes inhale helium in order to temporarily make their voices sound high-pitched. "Although this effect may be amusing, it can be dangerous if done in excess." (Id.) This is "because the helium displaces oxygen needed for normal respiration." (Id.) "Inhaling helium directly from pressurized cylinders is extremely dangerous, as the high flow rate can result in barotrauma, fatally rupturing lung tissue." (Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, Helium, available at http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Helium.) Additionally, "[o]n loss of containment this gas can cause suffocation by lowering the oxygen content of the air in confined areas." (See Lenntech, Water Treatment Solutions, Helium, available at http://www.lenntech.com/periodic/elements/he.htm.)
People v. Givenni, 27 Misc.3d 1135 (2010), available at https://www.leagle.com/decision/innyco20100421378 and https://law.justia.com/cases/new-york/other-courts/2010/2010-20138.html

(Note, there were no allegations in this case that anyone inhaled helium directly from pressurized containers or that anyone was harmed; only that the defendants sold helium balloons and that unspecified other parties later inhaled some helium from these balloons). NTK (talk) 00:28, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

This decision was criticized in a law review case comment by Colette Siesholtz:
In People v. Givenni, the court did not use Wikipedia merely as a collateral reference; rather, the Wikipedia definitions and descriptions of helium were used as the primary basis for the court’s central, factual finding that helium is a noxious gas and therefore prohibited for sale.
NYLS Law Review, vol 56, 2011/12 1635 at 1641. available at http://www.nylslawreview.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/16/2012/04/56-4.People-v-Givenni.Siesholtz.pdf
NTK (talk) 01:01, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Melting point

What is the purpose of listing a Melting point at 2.5 MPa? What is the melting point at atmospheric pressure? There is none, as far as I know...why not list that instead?

It is tradition by now. That is what everyone does. Gah4 (talk) 13:57, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
See Melting points of the elements (data page). Looks like at 1 atm, there is no melting point. -DePiep (talk) 14:18, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
So (unsigned) suggests just not putting any number. Gah4 (talk) 15:15, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
Helium has a melting point, but only at pressures above about 2.5 megapascals (25 atm). It seems reasonable to me to list its melting point at the lowest pressure at which it has one. --RexxS (talk) 18:04, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
Surely that ought to be absolute zero, though, where pressure exactly compensates for zero-point energy. Double sharp (talk) 06:26, 23 March 2019 (UTC)
I assure you it's not. Zero-point energy implies that that helium molecules still have energy even at absolute zero, which is why under atmospheric pressure, helium remains fluid no matter how low the temperature. There is a minimum pressure required for helium to achieve a solid state, and that turns out to be around 2.5 MPa. According to the sources, at that pressure, helium will be a solid below 0.95 K and liquid above it. If you're expecting intuitively that a lower melting point exists at a lower pressure, I think you'll find that you are mistaken. Quantum mechanics can be rather like that. --RexxS (talk) 14:55, 23 March 2019 (UTC)
Hmm. Melting points of the elements (data page) gives a value of 0 K for He, labelling it as "hcp crystal melting to He-II superfluid at 25.00 atm". 25.00 atm is listed in the source article as "P0(hcp + II), the equilibrium pressure at 0 K"; I confess I don't understand all of the paper, but since the melting point is supposed to be the temperature at which the solid and liquid states can exist in equilibrium, this bit seems relatively clear. It also seems to imply that 25 atm is indeed the lowest temperature that helium can freeze, and that indeed as I expected this is where the melting point is absolute zero. The value of 0.95 K, at least based on that data page, seems to only come from WebElements. The edit to the data page giving this extra detail and source on helium is here (from 15 March 2016 by Layzeeboi; I've invited him to this discussion.) Double sharp (talk) 16:30, 23 March 2019 (UTC)
P.S. This has come up before at Talk:List of chemical elements#Melting point of helium. Double sharp (talk) 16:35, 23 March 2019 (UTC)
I cited the source at https://web.archive.org/web/20080531145546/http://www.phys.ualberta.ca/~therman/lowtemp/projects1.htm which agrees with https://www.webelements.com/helium/ rather than a Wikipedia page, which is not a reliable source.
The discussion at Talk:List of chemical elements #Melting point of helium seems to be original research, based on the assumption that lowering the pressure always lowers the melting point because raising the pressure always raises melting point. That assumption is not necessarily true. I'm pretty certain that where https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2FBF00117245 (the article you cited) states "The minimum in the melting pressure occurs at 0.774 K and is 8.04 × 10−3 atm below the 0 K value.", it's telling us that there is a minimum value of the pressure required for a solid phase to exist, although it is giving 0.774 K as the temperature at which that minimum pressure occurs, It's worth noting that if the minimum pressure is around 25 standard atmospheres (2,500 kPa), then the required pressure at 0 K is only 0.03% above that, so they must have had some pretty sensitive methods of measuring.
I'm not bothered about which source you prefer, but all of the sources I've looked at indicate that there is a minimum pressure (as a function of temperature) for the solid phase to exist, and that the minimum doesn't occur at 0 K. Cheers --RexxS (talk) 17:09, 23 March 2019 (UTC)
All helpfull and clarifying here, but should this text not be in the actual article body text then? The infobox is supposed to reflect that text, no more. Also, in the text body there is more space for clarification. -DePiep (talk) 19:53, 23 March 2019 (UTC)
I agree, DePiep. There is a general dispensation in chemistry/physics articles to allow physical characteristics to be given in infoboxes without being in the article, but the minimum in the P-T relationship for the melting point seems to me so unintuitive that it deserves an explicit mention in the body of the article. Unfortunately, my physics degree predates much of the research cited and I never learned about it as an undergraduate. Perhaps one of the regular editors with a more modern understanding can craft something. --RexxS (talk) 00:13, 24 March 2019 (UTC)
Well, this is all very interesting! You learn something new every day, I guess. I very much agree that some details about this should be written in the article, along with an explanation for this highly counterintuitive behaviour. Double sharp (talk) 03:48, 24 March 2019 (UTC)

1K

The article says that Onnes cooled helium below 1K to liquify it, but the boiling point is closer to 4.2K. I will look through the reference, but I don't see why it should say 1K. Gah4 (talk) 17:39, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

The reference says 5K on page 18. Before actually seeing liquid, they noticed that it would stay at a nice constant temperature, a little less than 5K, a sign of a liquid. Gah4 (talk) 18:10, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

lede

A couple sentences into the lead (lede) is:"Its abundance is similar to this figure, in the Sun, and in Jupiter." It is, I believe, incorrectly punctuated. (I myself also overuse the comma, but this is worse than even I would do.) It should be (imho)"Its abundance is similar to this figure in the Sun and in Jupiter." I am also dubious that an abundance (value) can be "similar" to a figure. So, I suggest:"Its abundance is similar to this in both the Sun and Jupiter."40.142.185.108 (talk) 11:15, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

I've made a small copyedit to the lead to try to incorporate your suggestions (including the "after hydrogen, the second most"). Hopefully it will satisfy readers and avoid ambiguity. --RexxS (talk) 15:51, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

"After hydrogen, helium is the second lightest and second most abundant element in the observable universe"

Doesn't that title imply it's the third? Prinsgezinde (talk) 15:45, 3 October 2018 (UTC)

No. -DePiep (talk) 18:12, 3 October 2018 (UTC)
The hell it doesn't. It could be understood (especially by English as a second language readers) as just that - the third most abundant. For those unable to understand why it isn't clear, read this version:"After hydrogen, helium is the lightest and most abundant element in the observable universe." It has exactly the same meaning! Quaint idiom, maybe; but certainly not clear. Or don't you care?40.142.185.108 (talk) 11:06, 17 June 2019 (UTC)
I've done some rephrasing to remove ambiguity. Double sharp (talk) 04:34, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

New helium supply from Tanzania?

Interesting article at Bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-08-28/we-re-running-out-of-helium-and-helium-one-might-have-a-fix "In a typical mine (sic) where it can be profitably separated from the methane and other gases it’s bound up with, helium concentration stands at about 2%. According to the Investor’s Guide, the hot springs in southwestern Tanzania were spitting out gas with 5% to 15% helium in it. “I thought someone wrote it down wrong,” Bluett says, “that the decimal was in the wrong spot or something.” If the numbers were right, he and his former housemate had stumbled onto something better than a gold mine." Reporters! Gas well, of course.

"In 2016, NSAI said there could be as much as 98 billion cubic feet of helium below Mtili’s hot rock. That would be enough to fulfill global demand for 16 years. “To my knowledge, it was the largest primary helium reserve ever announced,” Bluett says. Goodbye, helium shortage—at least in theory."

Who knows what will become of this, but it's an interesting prospect, and the geologists seem smart & attentive. --Pete Tillman (talk) 21:19, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Cleveite or Uraninite

I've just reverted a series of changes that systematically replaced "Cleveite" with "Uraninite", describing the latter as the "correct name" for the former. I asked the editor for the source that supported the assertion, but they only provided generic links that didn't verify the addition in my opinion. What is clear to me is that the sources used in this Featured Article such as Kirk 2013 describe the mineral as cleveite, and that as "a variety of uraninite (UO2)". Now it may well be that the terminology used in the sources is old-fashioned, but it is what we find in the sources. Without a reliable source specifically showing that the term "cleveite" has been replaced by "uraninite", I don't think we should be deviating from what the sources use, particularly as a Featured Article may be assumed to have received a rigorous source check, especially having been through a FAR in 2014.

@Ryboy42, Sbharris, Stone, VexorAbVikipædia, EdChem, and DMacks: as the principal editors of the article, I'd be grateful your guidance. --RexxS (talk) 21:45, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

(1) Mineralogists still distinguish between uraninite and cleveite. (1a) Wikipedia itself distinguishes between cleveite and uraninite, providing separate articles for each. (1b) Similarly, Wikidata distinguishes cleveite as a variety of uraninite: Minerals, mainly: Section #1: non white streak, mainly: Oxide class (no olivines): Subsection #1.4: oxides, stricter sense. (1c) See also, for example, on the mineralogical Web site Mindat.org, where there are separate entries for Uraninite (https://www.mindat.org/min-4102.html) and Cleveite (https://www.mindat.org/min-29957.html), where Cleveite is described as "A REE[Rare Earth Element]-and Th[Thorium]-bearing variety of uraninite." (1d) In 1955, J.W. Frondel of the U.S. Geological Survey distinguished Cleveite as a variety of Uraninite: Frondel, J.W.; Fleischer, Michael (1955). Geological Survey Bulletin 1009-F: Glossary of Uranium- and Thorium-bearing Minerals (PDF) (3rd ed.). Washington, D.C., USA: United States Government Printing Office. p. 194. However, in 1958, Frondel called for eliminating the formal distinction: Frondel, Clifford (1958). Geological Survey Bulletin 1064: Systematic Mineralogy of Uranium and Thorium (PDF). Washington, D.C., USA: United States Government Printing Office. pp. 12–13. From pp. 12–13: "The names broggerite, cleveite, and nivenite were applied originally to minerals thought to be distinct from uraninite, and this usage has continued in some recent literature. All of these substances have been found by X-ray study, however, to be only compositional variants of uraninite marked by a relatively high content of rare earths. The name ulrichite was proposed to designate the hypothetical pure UO2 following the realization that uraninite was not a definite compound of both U+4 and U+6 — a uranyl uranate — but is more or less oxidized UO2. The above names serve no useful purpose and should be completely abandoned. Varieties of uraninite that contain significant amounts of other elements in solid solution should be designated by chemical adjectival modifiers, such as cerian uraninite, thorian uraninite, and the like, following the widely accepted modern convention." However, the composition of Cleveite (see columns 13 and 14 on p. 17) is not so distinct that Frondel's proposed nomenclature seems applicable; and even if Frondel's proposed nomenclature were applied to cleveite, cleveite would still be recognized as a distinct variety of uraninite, although it would no longer be called "cleveite".
(2) I would also point out that anyone doing research on the discovery of helium would be confused to discover that Ramsay isolated helium from some mineral that he called "cleveite", whereas Wikipedia would claim that he isolated it from "uraninite".
VexorAbVikipædia (talk) 06:03, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Medical uses

I find the newly added section Helium #Medical uses to be misleading, as it seems to imply that there was no FDA approval prior to April 2020. That is certainly not the case and a similar approval letter to a different supplier dated 2014 shows that every organisation who wishes to supply helium for medical use has a separate approval. Examining those is no way to establish when the US FDA first approved helium for medical use and we should not be stating dates without that information. I'm aware of studies on using heliox to reduce the effort of breathing in clinical settings dating back many years. In fact one such study is cited in the article: PMID 17701048 (2007), and a review from BOC in the UK of heliox21 begins "Helium/oxygen gas mixtures have been used in the medical setting for over fifty years." I really don't think that the content of a Featured article should be capable of misinterpretation by a casual reader, and I recommend removing that section, until more definitive sources are found. --RexxS (talk) 18:59, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

@RexxS: Thank you for your comments. They prompted me to search the FDA approval site for helium and I found earlier approvals with the earliest listed entry being in 2013. There were several approvals in 2013, one in 2014, one in 2016, one in 2018, two in 2019, and one in 2020. Here are the ones listed from 2013.
https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/daf/index.cfm?event=overview.process&ApplNo=205819
https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/daf/index.cfm?event=overview.process&ApplNo=205843
https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/daf/index.cfm?event=overview.process&ApplNo=205851
https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/daf/index.cfm?event=overview.process&ApplNo=205864
https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/daf/index.cfm?event=overview.process&ApplNo=205911
https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/daf/index.cfm?event=overview.process&ApplNo=205912
https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/daf/index.cfm?event=overview.process&ApplNo=206026
It makes sense to add a discussion of the medical benefits of helium to the article. For example, we could use PMID 31858285 as a source. A mixture like heliox has its own article. Whywhenwhohow (talk) 21:46, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
It does make sense to discuss medical uses of helium, but as far as I know, helium is administered medically only in the form of heliox. Perhaps a {{main|Heliox}} template would be appropriate? The sources used there might be helpful. --RexxS (talk) 22:06, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
@RexxS: Here are some examples of medical applications of helium PMID 23916029, PMID 14627474, PMID 17656203, PMID 31858285 Whywhenwhohow (talk) 01:42, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
@Whywhenwhohow: if you look carefully, I think you'll find the first three are studies of the possible use of He to replace CO2 for insufflation in certain surgeries, and the last discusses studies of the potential beneficial effects of He on the sequelae of an ischaemic event. They don't, as far as I can see, reflect any actual medical use of helium. Nevertheless, the last article does state "helium is used in treatment of airway obstruction and ventilation disorders", which is where it is administered as a helium–oxygen mixture (heliox), of course. --RexxS (talk) 20:12, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

Make-up

How come it doesn't say anywhere how many protons, neutrons and electrons it's made up of? Nor is an image of the molecule shown anywhere. Isn't that something that should be in the first or second paragraph of the introduction? I've been missing this on other elements also. Am I just not understanding something right? Cause I don't really know that much about these matters... When looking at the page of an element, how can I quickly know what its molecule is made up of? Thanks for any clarifications/explanations. 191.114.43.14 (talk) 05:32, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

These are in there soemhow, but not easily as plain numbers. In the infobox: The number of protons is the atomic number Z: 2 for helium. Importantly, the 2 also appears as subscripopt in the title: "2He" (because this 2 is identifying He, not just a property). The number of electrons: implicitly, that number is the same as Z when the atom is in rest (say, not in a compound). So number of electrons=2. This is the total number of "Electrons per shell"(which is more complicated in heavier elements; for example "2, 8, 3"= 13 for aluminium). The number of neutrons is not stable (in general, for all elements), and so is not a single number. The variants are listed in the list of "Main isotopes of helium", via a superscript: 3He, 4He (that is, minus the 2 protons that is 1 or 2 neutrons).
As for a drawing: for a simple element like helium this might be do-able: see Atomic number for example. But when atoms are heavier, the layout is not in a 2-dimensional form. See the image in Electron#Atoms_and_molecules: they appear more like "clouds" in various 3D-forms and directions.
Since this is the pattern for all elements, the numbers are not specified in this detail for each element. That would be rewriting these definitions in each element article. This build-up of atoms is mentioned in, for example, Atomic number, Neutron number, and Mass number. -DePiep (talk) 07:15, 23 September 2019 (UTC)
Since the OP mentions "molecules": this is a separate consideration from proton, neutron, and electron counts. DePiep has explained and given links for the latter: a helium atom always has 2 protons, as that is the defintion of the atomic number (otherwise it would not be helium), and thus to be electrically neutral it must have 2 electrons (otherwise you have a helium ion), but its number of neutrons can vary (1 or 2 neutrons both make a stable helium isotope; there are also some unstable helium isotopes with more neutrons). But as far as talking about a "helium molecule" makes any sense it must mean a single helium atom, as helium is monatomic. For other elements this can vary (nitrogen will be N2, but oxygen might be O2 or O3), and speaking of molecules does not quite make sense for metals like iron or silver with their giant metallic structures (neither does it make sense for the giant covalent structures of carbon or silicon). Such structural considerations will be mentioned in the article, although "crystal structure" (the way the atoms of an element arrange themselves in a bulk solid) also appears in the infobox. Double sharp (talk) 07:49, 23 September 2019 (UTC)
OP here. Good god, what was I thinking. Of course do I mean atom, and not molecule. You'll have to forgive me, it's not my field of expertise. But yes, wouldn't some form of graphical illustration of each atom in its "standard" or "neutral" form be useful? If such a thing exists. It would certainly be for me as a layman in order to visualize the thingy. At least in terms of ions, neutral would be imo when electrons equal protons. But for isotopes? is there a "neutral" form or are they simply equal variants? 191.114.57.105 (talk) 05:58, 27 September 2019 (UTC)
The usual atomic model images are somewhat fake. First, a nucleus is often pictured as packed together balls for protons and neutrons, which isn't quite right. There is no Pauli exclusion between protons and neutrons, so they pack separately. Also, there is no exclusion between opposite spins, so the helium nucleus (alpha particle) can have all the protons and neutrons together as one ball. This is why it is so stable. Next, things are moving around inside the nucleus at the Fermi velocity, including zero-point motion in the lowest state. In many cases, the nucleus can be considered as alpha particles moving around at high speed. As for electrons, the two s electron are in a spherically symmetric (s) state. I suppose a model of a fuzzy sphere isn't so far off, but doesn't really add much. Atoms with p electrons could have more interesting shapes. Gah4 (talk) 21:00, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
It might work for helium, where neutral helium would have 2 protons and 2 electrons: something like File:Atom.svg for helium-4. But it would quickly prove problematic for neutral uranium with 92 protons and 92 electrons: the protons are all going to be stuffed at the centre in the nucleus (we will assume for sanity that the atom is not drawn to scale, or you just see a lot of empty space between the nucleus and the electrons) and you can't see them all, let alone count them. The stable isotopes are basically equal variants; helium-3 and helium-4 both occur in nature and are both totally stable as far as we know. In the case of helium, helium-4 might be preferred as it is much more common than helium-3, but for a case like bromine with two isotopes (bromine-79 and bromine-81) of nearly equal abundance (51% and 49% respectively) there really is little reason to choose one over the other. For a radioactive transuranic element like californium you would also have the problem that it doesn't exist naturally on Earth anymore; you would have to choose either the most stable isotope (251) or the most commonly used isotope (252), and they are not the same. Double sharp (talk) 06:03, 27 September 2019 (UTC)
We've got a complete commons:Category:Electron shell diagrams (English) set of images, but those have the nucleus as a plain ball. That avoids having to pick an isotope (something that is, as noted, not intrinsic to the elemental identity anyway). Would be trivial to incorporate that completely automatically into the infobox of all elements. Is it useful in the general case, given how much of the interesting nature of many elements is when the electron count varies, and on the assumption that the fleetingly-existing synthetics aren't even neutral at all? DMacks (talk) 06:30, 27 September 2019 (UTC)
The synthetics are neutral: all the ones we know have half-lives comfortably longer than 10−14 seconds, enough to grab an electron cloud. Oganesson, the shortest-lived, has one confirmed isotope with a half-life of about 6.9×10−4 s. I guess it is conceivable that once we increase atomic number high enough we might reach something that lives for long enough to count as a nuclide (with nuclear shells) but not long enough to count as an element (no electron shells), which will make a fun argument. IIRC we once did have them automatically put in, but they were taken out, IIRC because they are not that good a reflexion of reality once Z gets high enough. (Though there isn't anything much better as far as diagrammatic representations go.) Double sharp (talk) 06:41, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

The members of the alkaline earth group do indeed have two electrons in the valence band

In the above discussion on the location of He, someone wrote: The members of the alkaline earth group do indeed have two electrons in the valence band. If those two electrons were in a single valence band, it would be full and the result would be an insulator. These elements are metals because those electrons distribute between two (or more) overlapping bands, which are then not full. It is especially interesting as Be has a positive Hall coefficient. The electrons divide such that a more than half full (hole) band supplies most of the conductivity. The ones under Be have negative (electron band) Hall coefficients, again distributing the electrons into more than one band. In the case of He, the gap is large, and the top band is full. Gah4 (talk) 05:51, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

@Gah4: Yes, metallic beryllium exists because the 2p band overlaps the 2s band in energy and is partly populated. Some overlap also happens for lithium; in fact the situation is analogous, since hydrogen has a huge energy gap from 1s to 2s, but lithium a small one from 2s to 2p (explains why H is a diatomic gas and Li is a metal). This sort of thing is why I've argued that helium over beryllium is in fact analogous to hydrogen over lithium: if the latter is standard, there really is not much to say against the former. Grochala says the same thing in his article when discussing the trends: "Remarkably, Group 1 and Group 2 elements show (quantitatively) very similar behaviour, so do Group 17 and Group 18 elements." Again, that's if you put hydrogen over lithium and helium over beryllium. Putting H-F and He-Ne gives differences, putting H-Li and He-Ne gives yet larger ones.
For calcium onwards, however, you have to consider the d-bands as well. So I would argue that helium in group 2 is somewhat natural: you have already shifted from "2 valence electrons, 6 vacancies in p-orbitals" from Be and Mg, to "2 valence electrons, 16 vacancies in p- and d-orbitals" for Ca and Sr. Is it really so bad to have before that for helium "2 valence electrons and no vacancies"? There's a precedent for the change, whereas in the noble gas group helium (2 electrons, 0 vacancies) is a one-off before everyone else has 8 electrons and 0 vacancies. Double sharp (talk) 06:08, 18 June 2020 (UTC)
(P.S. That's also my rejoinder to this paper, which gives an argument that He-Ne is better than He-Be. The difference in behaviour boils down to the presence of 2p on the beryllium atom, but this behaviour of the s-block taking orbitals of higher n+l is not new, you already see the inclusion of p at Li and Be and the inclusion of d at Ca, Sr, Cs, Ba; at high pressure even f joins in the fun at Cs and Ba. So I am personally more convinced by the argument "helium has two valence electrons and therefore must go in group II": H vs Li is the same idea as He vs Be, because of the absence of a 1p orbital. But again, my main point is that the fact that people are now publishing papers both in favour of He-Be and in favour of He-Ne surely means that we have to take this seriously.) Double sharp (talk) 09:15, 19 June 2020 (UTC)
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