Abstract
THE history of the discovery of helium presents some features of unusual dramatic interest. During an eclipse in 1868, Jansen and Lockyer noticed that the visual spectrum of the sun's chromosphere showed a bright yellow line of unknown origin. Later it was found that this line and others that accompanied it appeared not only in the sun, but also in many of the stars. Lockyer suggested that these lines were due to an undiscovered element, to which he gave the name helium.
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Rutherford, L. Helium and its Properties.*. Nature 128, 137–138 (1931). https://doi.org/10.1038/128137a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/128137a0