Neon is a noble gas that glows reddish-orange in high-voltage electrical discharge fields.
Core Principles & Analysis
William Ramsay and Morris Travers discovered neon in 1898 by fractionally distilling liquefied air, naming it from the Greek for 'new'.
It is chemically inert, forming no stable compounds, and glows a vivid red-orange when electricity passes through the low-pressure gas.
That glow made neon signs an icon of 20th-century advertising, and the element also serves in helium-neon lasers and as a compact cryogenic refrigerant.