The element Xenon is a heavy, inert, noble gas discovered by William Ramsay and Morris Travers in London in 1898 after they fractionally distilled liquid air.
Xenon, the neuter of Greek word xenos, meaning foreign, strange, or stranger, is a trace gas in the atmosphere at only 0.0000087% (0.087 vol ppm). The earth’s crust only contains 30 parts per trillion by weight and five parts per trillion by moles. With a relatively warm boiling point of -169.22° F (-111.8° C), liquefied xenon is nonetheless handled as a cryogen. It can be safely stored in foam insulated tanks or for longer periods in vacuum insulated cryogenic tanks.
In industry, xenon is used in some photographic flashes and in high pressure arc lamps used in certain movie projectors. Xenon can be used to produce ultraviolet light, and is used in radiation detection instruments, i.e. X-ray counters. Some automobiles now use xenon headlights, producing a high-intensity beam that uses less energy and last much longer than conventional or even halogen bulbs. In the medical realm, xenon is sometimes used as a general anesthetic and in some medical imaging devices.
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