Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Supernova thoughts



I want to understand ideas like nuclear fusion….inside stars—how hydrogen fuses into helium and on up the list of heavier atomic elements to eventually iron. At this point, the force of gravity that the star exerts is greater than its radiation and this event brings forth a supernova. The gaseous outer shell of the star comes crashing into the dense iron core creating this dramatic stellar explosion. Many more elements are cooked up at this point which makes them available to solar systems. Solar systems have all the available elements to create life, thanks to the supernovae. I’m dredging up things I learned a decade ago. Thanks to the internet we call learn more about hydrogen fusion but I learned this from watching videos like "Cosmos" from the library. If I'm even remotely correct in my understanding/recall here, I'm giving myself a fucking memory badge and a big thanks to the fantastic educator, Carl Sagan. 

6 comments:

  1. I think you more or less got it. My source however if from "Death from the Skiee!: These are the Ways the World Will End..." by Phil Plait. A great read.

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    1. Thank you so much John! I always enjoy reading your comments and thanks for the book suggestion. I've heard of Phil PLait but have never read anything by him before. Thank you :)

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    2. He has a blog. Look up bad astronomy. In his book he has the best intro. You can see it on amazon.com when you look up the book. On the same note, I've mentioned this on one of your youtube videos on evolution, another good book is "Evolution: What the Fossils say and Why it Matters" by Donald Prothero. You might even get good material for future videos.

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  2. Yes we are star dust and will all end back as star dust one day.

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    1. Maybe I should have written;

      Remember man(woman) that you are (star) dust and to (star) dust you shall return.

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  3. Renee, I've written about Stellar nucleosynthesis (a fancy name for nuclear fusion inside stars), supernovae and so forth in my blog. Check out my posts, beginning on November 27, 2011.

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