We're all dead stars

Every once in awhile, I stop to ponder this amazing thing we call life and the fact that all of the elements heavier than hydrogen and helium were created with the massive power in an exploding star. And that means that most of us, our hair and skin, our brains are built from matter that was created in an exploding star. Pretty neat.

The first stars, and dark matter

Scientist recently announced that they've discovered "fingerprints" of the earliest stars. These aren't your garden variety neutron, red giants, or yellow dwarfs (shout-out to my favorite ball of hydrogen and helium eight light minutes away). These were the pioneers of "today's" stars, big, blue, fast-living and fast-dying.

This is amazing. These stars were around only about 180 million years after the Big Bang, which occurred 13.8 billion years ago. When they collapsed and exploded, the universe welcomed its first heavy matter (everything other than hydrogen, helium and a smattering of lithium). These stars were really the first baby steps of what makes us possible. Most people aren't aware that somewhere in the neighborhood of 90 percent of our bodies is made from elements created in an exploding star.

Now these puppies apparently acted a little weird and one scientist has proposed that it's because their hydrogen interacted with dark matter. This is getting beyond me, but it seems until now dark matter was believed to only interact with normal matter through gravity. I'm not touching this one.

Isn't science great?
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