The Rare Gases of the Atmosphere

Details The Rare Gases of the Atmosphere The Rare Gases of the Atmosphere

Dec 1924

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1924natur.114..934j&link_type=abstract

Nature, Volume 114, Issue 2878, pp. 934 (1924).

Physics

Geophysics

Scientific paper

ONE of the unsolved questions of geophysics is whether the earth's atmosphere is mainly primitive, or whether its constituents have for the most part been evolved from the interior of the earth since solidification. Dr. Aston's letter (NATURE, NOV. 29, p. 786) may help to answer this question. The tendency of a gravitating planet to collect heavier molecules to itself, and in certain circumstances to lose the lighter ones, would not by itself account for the rarity of the inert gases. Xenon and krypton have the highest molecular weights of all the atmospheric gases, and would therefore be the most abundant if this were the sole explanation. Possibly the ability of other elements to form stable solid and liquid compounds has co-operated. If so, we may contemplate a heated primitive earth surrounded by a tenuous atmosphere consisting largely of the rare gases as at present represented, with the possible exception of helium. The greater part of the atmosphere, the water, and perhaps the helium, would have been emitted from the interior in the course of the earth's development.

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