
Helium (from Greek:meaning ‘sun’) is an element with the symbol He and atomic number 2. It is a colourless gas, exhibiting a grey, cloudy glow (or reddish-orange if an especially high voltage is used) when placed in an electric field.
Uses of Helium
- as a protective gas in growing silicon and germanium crystals
- in titanium production
- in gas chromatography since it is inert
- since it is lighter than air, airships and balloons are inflated with helium for lift https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium

We all say that inhaling helium changes our voice but do we know how?
Technically, helium doesn’t change the pitch of our voice. Let’s start by how our vocal chords work. When you talk, your vocal cords vibrate at a particular frequency and their movement pushes the air around it in your voice box. That motion of air causes a sound wave that then gets picked up by the ears of the person listening to you.
The speed of sound increases with the stiffness of a medium and decreases with its density. The reason sound travels faster through water than through air is because water is stiffer than air. Helium has a lower density than air which causes sound waves to propagate about 2.7 times faster. Your vocal chords still vibrate at the same frequency even after inhaling helium.
The human voice is made up of a mixture of tones. Inhaling helium makes the higher-pitched tones resonate more in the vocal tract, amplifying them so they are louder in the mix. At the same time, it makes the lower tones resonate less in the vocal tract. Essentially, the higher frequencies become stronger, they’re amplified over the lower frequencies.
There are some effects of inhaling helium. To understand more refer to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium#Inhalation_and_safety
To listen as audio visit: https://anchor.fm/inlovewithchemistry/episodes/Heliums-effect-on-our-voice-e1qpjqr
