--- title: "There Appears to Be a Slow Leak in Earth’s Core, Scientists Say" description: "A team of scientists say they have found evidence that suggests the Earth's core has slowly been leaking helium over billions of years." date: "2023-10-23" modified: "2023-10-23" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/slow-leak-earth-core-helium" categories: - "Science & Energy" tags: - "earth's core" - "helium" - "noble gas" - "the digest" --- # There Appears to Be a Slow Leak in Earth’s Core, Scientists Say ![A team of scientists say they have found evidence that suggests the Earth's core has slowly been leaking helium over billions of years.]() *\Image: Getty / Futurism\* ## Sad Balloon Noises Helium, the [second-most common]() element in the known universe, is astonishingly rare on Earth. It's the only element that's completely nonrenewable on our planet, making it increasingly difficult to come by. We extract it from natural gas deposits in the planet's crust that slowly form as they rise through the Earth's layers and eventually diffuse into the atmosphere. Exactly how much is left of the stuff is still largely a mystery. The theory goes that since it hasn't entirely vanished over billions of years, the Earth's core may be leaking it from much larger yet undiscovered reserves. Now, a team of scientists from the California Institute of Technology and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution has studied samples taken from lava fields in the Baffin Islands in Canada and Iceland and discovered that they contain mysteriously similar concentrations of helium isotopes, suggesting they came from the same source deep, deep underground — and which has indeed been slowly leaking the stuff over time. It's not only a tantalizing glimpse into the earliest days of our planet, but also potentially a huge chance to study the Earth's extremely inaccessible core. ## Gas Backward As detailed in a [paper]() published in the journal *Nature*, the scientists concluded that this source might originate in the Earth's core. They came to this conclusion by taking into consideration the presence of other noble gases such as neon, which coincides with the conditions present at the time when the Earth was still actively forming billions of years ago. The scientists conclude that if they're right about where these gases are coming from, it could give us invaluable insights into the processes and conditions present when our planet came into existence and studying the Earth's core, which is, of course, trapped under thousands of miles of rock and liquid metal. There's still a lot we don't know about our planet's composition — but this latest piece could be part of a much larger puzzle about how the Earth formed. **More on the Earth's core:** [Scientists Discover Gigantic Solid Metal Ball Inside the Earth's Core]() ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()