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helium

he·lium

UK/ˈhiː.li.əm/ US/ˈhiliʌm/ fairly common

noun

1.

a very light colorless element that is one of the six inert gasses; the most difficult gas to liquefy; occurs in economically extractable amounts in certain natural gases (as those found in Texas and Kansas)

Synonyms

Origin

From New Latin helium, from Ancient Greek ἥλιος (hḗlios, “sun”) (because its presence was first theorised in the Sun's atmosphere) with the suffix + -ium. Probably coined by Norman Lockyer. This suffix is unusual, because it is usually used only for metallic elements. It is likely that Lockyer, being an astronomer, was unaware of the usual chemical conventions.

Phrases

  • antiprotonic helium
  • helium balloon
  • helium burning
  • helium dating
  • helium descrambler
  • helium flash
  • helium fusion
  • helium hydride

Related words

Word family

Broader terms

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.