The supernova remnant Cassiopeia A contains signatures of a wide variety of elements of the periodic table, including everything necessary to create DNA. Image credit: NASA/CXC/SAO.

Astrophysics Reveals The Origin Of The Human Body

It isn’t the Big Bang or stars like the Sun that gave rise to us. The story is far more… explosive.

At the smallest level, the human body is made up of particles: mostly atomic nuclei and electrons.

The elements in the human body. While, by mass, we are mostly Oxygen, Carbon, Hydrogen, and Nitrogen, there are dozens of elements essential to life processes in the human body. Image credit: Openstax college, Anatomy & Physiology, Connexions Web site.

Although there are some 90 naturally occurring elements, they originate from a huge variety of places prior to ever arriving on Earth.

The Big Bang produces matter and antimatter, with slightly more matter being created at some point, leading to our Universe today. In the earliest stages, before any stars form, only hydrogen, helium, and trace amounts of lithium are produced. Image credit: E. Siegel / Beyond The Galaxy.

The hot Big Bang provides the origin of the lightest elements: hydrogen and helium, which still make up 98% of today’s Universe.

An artist’s impression of the environment in the early Universe after the first few trillion stars have formed, lived and died. The existence and life cycle of stars is the primary process that enriches the Universe beyond merely hydrogen and helium. Image credit: NASA/ESA/ESO/Wolfram Freudling et al. (STECF).

Stars that live, burn, and die provide that other 2%, claiming responsibility for the complex molecules contained in our Universe.