The Periodic Table Is More than a List of Elements: It Tells Us the Story of Our Universe
New elements are born from the ashes of dying stars
Do you remember your High School chemistry classes?
Perhaps they were a little like mine: row upon row of wooden benches, dark brown with age, and covered with various scars from experiments gone wrong. I’ll never forget the smell — burnt and sulphurous, heavy with dust and edged with that unmistakable tang of acid. And, in the corner, looking forlorn and neglected, would hang a periodic table. The poster’s corners curled, its edges ripped and the once vibrant colours faded.
A copy of the periodic table is found in almost every chemistry lab, yet it rarely receives much attention. For many, it’s merely a list: an obscure tally of letters and numbers.
But the periodic table is so much more than a list —if we look closely, we see that it tells the story of our universe, through the eyes of each of the elements.
