The Mystery of Missing Xenon

A space shuttle bathed in xenon lights

Xenon is a Noble Gas on the Periodic Table of Elements. It is a heavy and odorless gas that is found in trace amounts in the Earth's atmosphere. It is used in some very rare ways like for a gas-discharge lamps, an exicplex laser, and in an anestetic because of advances in the recovery and recycling of xenon.


According to Sciencenews.org scientists predictions have in the past said there should be much more of the gas Xenon in the Earth's atomosphere. They thought that this noble gas would be traped and dissolved in the the depths of the earth. After billions of years it should have been released into the atmosphere. There is much less Xenon than expected though, so where did it go?



Xenon gas discharge tube

Many experiments, research and studying have been done on the minerals deeper within the earth by scientists (Shcheka and Keppler). Perovskite is the mineral they had the most focus on. In lab experiments the perovskite has behaved unexpectedly; sometimes replacing a spot that oxegyn usually fills to be filled by a different noble gasses, such as argon, krypton, and xenon. The xenon atoms are significantly larger than the other gasses atoms though, therefore there is less xenon in the perovskite structures. In experiments scientists dissolved the perovskite to see which dissolved the best. Argon and krypton both dissovled fairly well while the xenon did not.

The Scientists believe that when the Earth was forming the perovskite trapped oxegyn, argon, and krypton but very little xenon. They say "we will never find xenon, that it was already lost at the beginning of Earth's evolution."