ASU: How the Early Universe Made Chemical Elements

[bystander]

Astrophysicists to probe how early universe made chemical elements
Arizona State University | 2014 Sep 10

ASU astrophysicists have received an important research grant to study how massive stars, such as Eta Carinae, depicted here, evolve and eventually seed the universe with heavy elements created by nuclear reactions inside them. [b][i]Credit: Gemini Observatory and Lynette Cook[/i][/b]

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In the beginning, all was hydrogen – and helium, plus a bit of lithium. Three elements in all. Today's universe, however, has nearly a hundred naturally occurring elements, with thousands of variants (isotopes), and more likely to come. ...

Time started 13.7 billion years ago with the Big Bang, which produced the basic three elements. Yet by the time the Bang was a billion years old, essentially all the other chemical elements we know had formed. How did this happen?

"It takes place inside stars," says Timmes. "They're the element-factories of the universe. They take light stuff, such as hydrogen and helium, process it in nuclear reactions, and then crank out carbon, nitrogen, oxygen and all those good things that make you and me."

While the broad outline is clear, details are a lot murkier, he says, and that's where ASU's researchers enter the picture. ...