The Remnants of Stars

written by Mohammed Idrees Bhatti

Hydrogen is the simplest element and makes up over 90 percent of the atoms in the known universe. Elements heavier than hydrogen are synthesized in the deep core of stars during the life cycle of the star, where tremendous temperatures and pressures cause the fusion of hydrogen atoms into more complex elements. With the exception of some light elements, all the elements that occur in nature are remnants of stars that exploded long before the solar system came into existence. These star remnants are the building blocks of all matter. Different combination of these elements give rise to all matter, living or nonliving. Living things are mainly composed of 4 elements: carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen. We are made of stardust means that these elements and other atoms that make up our body originated in the deep interiors of ancient stars that have exploded long ago.

What are the tiny building blocks from which matter or stardust is made of? To answer this question you could take a fantasy trip using your fertile imagination. Remember kids rhyme--Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. Imagine you are sitting on a branch of a huge tree. Suddenly, you fall off in a slow motion and while falling to the ground you also slowly shrink in size. What would you see in this trip? As you fall and approach the ground, you brace yourself for a great impact against solid ground. Also as you get nearer and nearer to it, becoming smaller and smaller all the times, you observe that ground is not as smooth as it has cracks--microscopic irregularities.

As you continue to shrink in size, you again brace yourself for impact against the floor of a crack which looks like a canyon floor only to find that bottom of the canyon is itself a myriad of cracks and crevices. Becoming still smaller and falling into one of those crevices, you see the solid walls have given way to nebulous surfaces that wobble and pucker. You would note that wobbling surfaces consist of hazy blobs of different shapes, spherical and elliptical, making up a complicated structures.

Falling further, you again brace yourself for impact against a cloudy spheroid as you approach closer and closer and as you become smaller and smaller in size. Wow!-- you have penetrated into a new universe called atom. You have fallen into a sea of emptiness, occupied by specks that move at unbelievably high speeds. Atom is as empty of matter as the solar system.

Assuming during the fall, you have attained high energy more than 22 TeV, you would brace yourself for impact against a solid nucleus of the atom. Entering the nucleus you would embrace tiny balls called neutrons and protons. Falling with increasing energy and decreasing size, further, you would penetrate into a proton or neutron. Again you would brace yourself for impact against the colorful red, blue and green quarks linked with gluons. You would note gluons throb and pucker holding quarks and quark giving rise to 0 or 1 unit of charge. These quarks belong to a family of quarks u,d,s,c,b, and t, none found free in space.

Falling further and further through a quark you would even find more interesting things. You might note sharks or preons or lurks. Falling still further with ever decreasing size into the stomach of a shark you might make direct hit with fundamental particles. These might be ageless fundamental particles of which matter is made. They are like matter and antimatter or particle and antiparticle or particle and virtual particle. These basic constituents develop simultaneously in steps to form atoms, matter-antimatter, and our body. Then atoms combine into simple or complex molecules. This molecule can be as complex as the double helix of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)-- the basic building block of life. The DNA consists of millions of atoms.

Question is, does a fundamental particle decay into another fundamental particle? It is impossible to split a fundamental particle-- principle of reality. It turns out that a particle decays into a smaller particle and a virtual force-carrier particle. This virtual particle decays into yet another particle and photon. These virtual particles seem to violate the conservation of energy because they exist at extremely high energies. However, These virtual particles exist so shortly that no rules are broken. Due to the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, these high energy virtual particles may exist if they are short lived. This means they escape reality's notice. They can never be observed. Nevertheless, the energy of the initial decaying particle and the final decay products is equal-- energy is conserved. For example see neutron beta decay process.

The bottom line is " Not a single particle or virtual-particle moves without obeying the orders of God"

Big question is "are we literally breathing each other?" yes, consider the many thousands of breaths people exhale, there are many atoms in your lungs at any moment that were once in the lungs of every person who ever lived. When you feel like you'll never amount to anything, relax and take a deep breath. The atoms that now compose you will live forever in the bodies of all the people on earth who are yet to be.

Question: If an electron and a positron collide to produce a Z, is the Z a virtual-particle?