What do you think of when you first think about the element Helium? Most would think about balloons. Helium was first discovered by Williams Ramsay in 1895. Ramsay was a Scottish chemist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry and discovered noble gases. Helium is a gas, meaning that in its original state it isn't visible to the human eye. Helium is the second element in the first row of the Periodic Table of Elements. Helium doesn't have any properties that appeal to our senses. It is completely odorless and doesn't have a color. To add on, it doesn't react to any element as it is a noble gas. Helium's atomic weight is 4.003, its atomic number is 2, and the symbol is He.

Now that we have the numbers out of the way, let's talk about its history and its applications. The element Helium's name comes from the Greek word "helios", meaning sun. The reason behind naming it after this word was because scientists found traces of helium in the sun before on Earth. Helium is used in many areas of our life. Most of the common applications include balloons, weather balloons, and airships.

Helium is also used alongside neon in the lasers when the cashier scans barcodes at the grocery store. It is also used to cool satellite instruments and in MRI scans.