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Asked by Joe to Laura, Matthew, Andrew, Rebecca on 19 Nov 2014.
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Matthew Camilleri answered on 19 Nov 2014:
Well, it is thought that in the big bang a lot of hydrogen was formed via high energy radiation where a number of neutrons, electrons and protons fused together to make the first elements. This hydrogen can then fuse together to form higher mass elements, such as helium and lithium. Some of these elements would be unstable isotopes, and therefore these would again fuse together to make larger elements.
It is important to note that these fusion reaction would cannot be really imagined by the human mind, as the temperatures that were present during the big bang were massive, something that not even the centre of the sun could come close to.
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Laura Schofield answered on 19 Nov 2014:
As Matthew said, they were all formed in the Big Bang. We’re not 100% sure what exactly happened in the Big Bang, but we are getting closer and closer to understanding it! Ask us again in a few years and we might be able to give you a clearer answer!
All of the other elements are made by fusing other atoms together. It takes a huge amount of energy because as we all know, two positive nuclei want to repel and the electrons whizzing round the outside don’t exactly help matters! Whenever you hear about new elements being discovered it’s because a team of scientists have successfully smashed nuclei together to form a new, heavier nucleus with more protons (and if the proton number is unique, that’s a new element!) Unfortunately they aren’t very stable though so don’t hang around long. -
Andrew McKinley answered on 19 Nov 2014:
To answer this we basically need to travel back in time…
Today we have all the elements of the periodic table…. These were formed in stars by smashing simpler elements together.
Curiously, there is something of a “midpoint” of the periodic table. That midpoint is Iron. Stars during their normal life are capable of taking hydrogen and mashing hydrogen atoms together to make helium (releasing energy), mashing those together to make lithium and beryllium (releasing energy), mashing *those* together … etc. However, Iron is the heaviest element which can be made this way, and this is why iron is so frequently said to make up the cores of planets and super-dense stars. To mash any other nucleus into iron to make another element *consumes* energy, rather than releasing it – and only processes which release energy will happen inside a star.
To make the heavier atoms takes something a bit special – there you need a massive energy release while mashing nuclei together – they will soak up some of this energy and fuse together, forming the heavier elements. This only really happens during a supernova – a star exploding! It throws out all these elements – the mixed soup of elements including hydrogen and every other element – and from this dust a solar system can form.
OK, so second part: Where did the hydrogen come from? I’m going to use the word “soup” a lot – it’s easier than typing “superheated plasma”
The Big Bang was a massive release of energy. As you will know, energy and mass are connected by the Einstein relationship E=mc. This energy started to condense as matter, and formed a really really *really* hot “soup”. As the ‘soup’ cooled, particles fused together to create larger particles – quarks grouped to form “hadrons” (protons and neutrons) (about one microsecond after the big bang); this gave hydrogen nuclei (lone protons)
It cools further; eventually helium nuclei form alongside the hydrogen after about 30 minutes, (two protons, two neutrons). Around 400,000 years after the big bang, the universe is now cool enough for these nuclei to capture electrons – and this is where the hydrogen comes from.The large hadron collider in Switzerland is trying to recreate these conditions to find out just what happens when there is so much energy around – what happens to the hadrons (protons and neutrons) when there is that much energy available to them!
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