Does the Sun contain the Periodic Table of elements?

[JimD]

----------------- #1220 - Does the Sun Contain the Periodic Table?

- This review discusses how the stars and the Sun formed the elements in the Periodic Table. You will learn how elements are identified in the stars. Discoveries are made in the stars that are later reproduced in the laboratories on Earth. Discoveries of the abundance of elements in the Sun tell astronomers about the evolution of the Universe.

- Attachment: Sun

- Does the Sun contain all the elements in the Periodic Table, or, is it just made of hydrogen and helium? Well, for sure the Sun is mostly hydrogen because that is the fuel for the fusion into helium that creates all the energy we live by. The Sun should have enough hydrogen to burn for another 5,000,000,000 years. All the stars in the night sky are doing the same thing, fusing hydrogen into helium. In fact, that is what the Big Bang did as well. It started out with Quarks and Leptons, fused to Protons and Neutrons, and then to hydrogen, helium and lithium. But, that is it. The Big Bang expansion was so fast that when it got to lithium more fusion stopped.

- Lithium has three protons in the nucleus and is considered one of the light elements. Each of the elements in the Periodic Table contain more protons in their nucleus. How did the heavier elements get created? And, does our Sun create these heavier elements? Yes, our Sun does, but, only up to Carbon and Oxygen once all the hydrogen fuel runs out these are the last fusion elements. Do the bigger stars create these heavier elements? Yes, but even the biggest stars only fuse elements up to Iron then fusion stops because Iron will not participate in fusion reactions.

- Then, how did the heaviest elements get created? The heaviest elements were created when the stars exploded into supernovae! Does our Sun contain these heavier elements? Yes, if it acquired them from other Supernovae. It will not become a supernova itself because it is not big enough. Let’s start with what is going on in the Sun. The simple version first before it gets more complicated:

- The Sun is a giant ball of Hydrogen gas that creates radiation energy by fusing Hydrogen nuclei into helium nuclei. A Helium nucleus is 2 protons and 2 neutrons but it is slighter lighter than two Hydrogen isotope nuclei, called Deuterium, with 1 proton and 1 neutron. Two Deuterium are 0.7% lighter than one Helium nucleus. That 0.7% of mass got converted into energy when the fusion into Helium occurred. E=mc^2. Mass was converted into energy according to this equation that everybody knows. The fusion occurs at the center of the Sun where the temperature is in the millions of degrees. The energy in the form of Gamma Rays released by the fusion reaction has to fight its way to the surface against the enormous gravity and through all the collisions with other hydrogen atoms. It looses so much energy in this journey to the surface the radiation energy leaving the surface is much lower in energy and longer in wavelength , closer to greenish blue light.

- That greenish blue light travels to Earth in about 8 minutes covering the 93,000,000 miles. When it strikes Earth’s atmosphere the blue light gets filtered out creating our blue skies. The sunlight that reaches the surface is more yellow in wavelength. We always color the Sun yellow when we are in kindergarten. But, things are more complicated than this. There is much more happening in the Sun and much more than greenish blue light hit’s the Earth. The full range of the electromagnetic spectrum is present to various degrees. And, there are fundamental particles striking Earth as well as radiation. Electrons, positrons, protons in the form of low energy Cosmic Rays. Neutrinos in the trillions. See Review #1219 to learn more about neutrinos that are striking the Earth.

- And, the Sun is more complicated than just Hydrogen gas being converted into Helium. The Sun was born 4,600,000,000 years ago. It contains all the elements that were in the Interstellar Medium at the time it was formed. It would be interesting to know in what proportions all the elements in the Periodic Table were in existence at that time. We could tell a lot about the evolution of the Universe and all the other stars if we had this data on the Sun.

- Our Sun was an intergalactic gas cloud back then. It started out as gas and dust called the Interstellar Medium. The makeup of the medium is what should be the makeup of the Sun we see today. Assuming no particular elements were created or destroyed by the Sun in the meantime.

- The Big Bang started out with immense temperatures and cooled as it expanded. It expanded and cooled so fast that protons and neutrons only had time to form the three lightest elements, hydrogen(1), helium(2), and lithium(3). The numbers in the parentheses are the number of protons in each nucleus. All the elements that are heavier, that contain more protons in their nucleus, were formed in the stars that gravity created some 100,000,000 years after the Big Bang. If our Sun was born among these first stars it would contain only these three elements. Heavier elements were created in the nuclear fusion in these first stars and in the supernovae explosions that occurred when they died.

- There are two types of supernovae explosions. Stars are born due to a slight over density in the giant molecular clouds of the Interstellar Medium. The densities are created by shockwaves, sound waves, magnetic field intensities, gravity from other masses, or some other medium turbulences. Once a denser region is formed gravity takes over to make it even denser. Within only 1,000,000 years the dust and gas cloud can condense into a spinning protostar with a circumstellar disk. Gravity continues to compress the core into it reaches temperatures of 1,000,000 degrees. At these temperatures the isotope of hydrogen, deuterium, begins to fuse into helium and the protostar begins to shine. Deuterium is one proton and one neutron. Gravity continues to compress the core of the star until it reaches 10,000,000 degrees and then hydrogen nuclei (protons) can fuse directly into helium. At this point the radiation energy comes into perfect balance with gravity and a stable star is formed. As long as the hydrogen fusion continues the star lives a long life.

- The first stars formed were massive and did not live a very long life, maybe only 10,000,000 years before a supernovae death. All their hydrogen burned so quickly because they were so bright. All the hydrogen fused into helium, the helium into carbon and Oxygen, into Neon and right up the Periodic Table until the fusion process reached the heaviest element Iron. Iron fusion absorbs energy rather that emitting energy. Fusion stops. There is no radiation left to balance the compressing force of gravity. The star collapses. The collapsing energy rebounds at the core into a giant explosion called a Supernova Type I. The explosion spreads its gas and dust into the interstellar medium to form new stars. This time the medium contains the heavier elements. If our Sun was formed at this time it would contain whatever abundance of elements that existed after the first big stars exploded.

- The Universe was still expanding and cooling. The next generation of stars were more diverse in mass. Not all were giants but there were many smaller stars like our Sun that live longer lives, say 15,000,000,000 years. For smaller stars that do not burn so hot or so fast their hydrogen fuels lasts a long time. When their hydrogen runs out their fusion stops with Carbon and Oxygen because they do not have enough gravity to fuse heavier elements. Stars the size of our Sun will die as Planetary Nebulae with a core called a White Dwarf made of Carbon and Oxygen. It is not the radiation pressure that is keeping White Dwarfs from further collapse but the pressure of the electrons in the atoms themselves. If they collapse further the electrons collapse as well into the protons to form neutrons and a Neutron Star. This can happen if a White Dwarf acquires more mass. Often in the early denser Universe stars there were companion stars orbiting each other around a center of gravity. When binary stars were close enough the larger star would draw gas and mass from the smaller star. When the larger star reached 1.4 Solar Mass the electrons collapsed creating the second type of Supernovae Type Ia.

- The more of these Supernovae that occurred the more of the heavier elements that were spread though out the Interstellar Medium. Elements heavier that iron were fused inside the immense shockwaves of these explosions. If our Sun were born at this time It would contain all the elements of the Periodic Table. So, does it? How do we find out?

- We find out what elements are in the Sun and the stars by using spectrum analysis. We shine sunlight through a prism and spread the spectrum of light out to where we can identify the individual wavelengths of light. The spectrum runs from radio waves to Gamma Rays, from the biggest wavelengths to the smallest wavelengths. When we do this we see that the spectrum is not continuous as it should be. There are dark lines of missing wavelengths. This means that that particular wavelength has been absorbed in its journey from the core of the Sun to the surface of the Earth. Each absorption line is unique to the particular element or atom that absorbed it.

- An atom is a proton with an orbiting electron. Each element has a different number of protons and that number of electrons. Heavier elements have more protons in the nucleus and more electrons in the orbiting shells around the nucleus. Each shell is at a unique energy level for each electron. If a light photon strikes an atom and an electron absorbs the energy of that particular photon the electron jumps to that particular shell with that particular energy. Each is unique so each of the dark absorption lines in the spectrum is unique for each element. The electrons will drop back to lower energy shells and emit the same amount of energy, or possibly a lower amount of energy if the drop is first to intermediate shells. The absorption and emission lines become fingerprints to identify each particular element.

- ( Think of all the colors you see around you. Each color is light of a different wavelength. The colors that you see have been reflected or absorbed by different elements that make up different objects around you. You do not see the absorbed wavelengths you do see the reflected wavelengths. So something that looks red really absorbed blue and you see it as red. Sometimes the object absorbs light and the electron jumps to intermediate shells emitting lower energy light in the form of infrared. You can not see infrared but you can feel it. Put your hand on the object and it fells warm. What you are seeing and feeling is your bodies form of spectrum analysis. Amazing as our bodies are we operate on a very limited part of the electromagnetic spectrum. ( Light is 390, extreme violet, to 780 nanometers, extreme red, infrared wavelengths cover the range from 780 to 100,000,000 nanometers. The electromagnetic spectrum is charted from 100,000,000,000,000,000 nanometers, radio waves, to 0.0000001 nanometers, Gamma Rays. )

- So, what is the conclusion? Does the Sun have all the elements of the Periodic Table or not?

- Well, yes it does. But, the Sun is mostly hydrogen and it will be burning up that hydrogen at the rate of 4,000,000 tons per second for the next 5,000,000,000 years.
- Helium is 8.5% the abundance of hydrogen.
- Oxygen is next at 0.05% the abundance of hydrogen.
- Next comes Carbon and Neon.
- Next Nitrogen.
- Lithium, Beryllium and Boron have very low concentrations because they are too light to participate in the fusion process.

- The even numbered atoms are more abundant that the odd numbered atoms because nature has a preference for protons in pairs in atomic nuclei.

- Of the 90 natural elements in the Periodic Table spectrum analysis has identified 64 to be in the Sun.
- Hydrogen(1) and Helium(2), and Lithium(30 came from the Big Bang.
- Stellar fusion has produced Carbon(6), Oxygen(8), and Iron (26).
- Giant stars and Supernovae nucleosynthesis have produced Copper(29), Silver(47), Platinum(78), Gold(79) , Mercury(80), Tin(50), Tantalum(73), Uranium(92).

The numbers in prentices are the number of protons and electrons in each element . Heavier elements add neutrons to the nucleus to make them heavier. These very heavy elements decay back to less heavy elements through radioactive decay. Neutrons decay into protons in Beta Decay radiation. For example Uranium (92) will eventually decay back to Lead (82). Many other heavier elements in the periodic are man-made and do not occur in nature as stable atoms. Science actually discovered helium(2) on the Sun before it was discovered in the laboratories on Earth. New unknown spectral absorption lines were discovered in 1868 while astronomers were looking at a solar eclipse. The Greek word for “helium” is the “Sun“. It was not until 1898 that the helium gas was actually discovered to exist on Earth.

- Spectral lines also identify the velocity of stars, the temperature of stars, the existence of binary stars, and so much more. It is all in the details. Our Universe is more complex that we can ever give it credit for. If you want to discover more learn more math and science. There lies the secret to discovering the Universe’s what, when, and how. The why may be left to other studies outside of math and science. Stay tuned. Announcements will be made shortly.
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