3QLA1 PHYSICAL SCIENCE

Name:___________________________ Grade & Section/Specialization: ______________

TOPIC: FORMATION OF ELEMENTS: NUCLEOSYNTHESIS

Have you tried staring at the moon and the stars at night? Have you asked yourself why do
they exist? Do you believe that you are made from these heavenly bodies? In this lesson, you will
discover how elements are made and how these celestial bodies exist by going back to the
beginning of the universe, and how you were made out from it.
HOW IT ALL BEGAN

It all started with the Big Bang. Scientists believe that the formation of the universe began
through the explosion of a primordial atom which happened 13.8 billion years ago. According to the
theory, everything started from a super immense, super dense, and super-hot singularity which then
inflated and brought forth our universe. There is no area around the singularity – just void. This signifies
that everything including space, time, matter and energy started from that singularity.
Then all of it began to quickly expand in a process called as inflation. Space itself expanded
faster than the speed of light. After the inflation, fundamental particles such as quarks, lepton, hedrons
were given birth. However, these also produced a super-hot environment for the particles to bind. In this
still hot and dense mass of the universe, pairs of matter and antimatter (quarks and antiquarks) were
formed from energy, but these pairs cancelled each other back into energy (annihilation). The
temperature is still too intense to bind fundamental particles together.
Fortunately, the universe cooled down as it expanded. As it did, new particles started to form out of
the pre-existing ones. This process gave rise to protons and neutrons- that we know today as the
subatomic particles that make up an atom. These excess matter (electrons, protons, neutrons and other
particles) somehow came to be in a highly energetic “plasma soup.” Photons (light particles) were being
scattered everywhere in this “soup”.
From about a second to a few minutes cosmic time after the Big Bang, the temperature of the
universe has fallen, just right for protons and neutrons to combine and form certain species of atomic
nuclei. This phase is known as Big Bang Nucleosynthesis.
Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (or primordial nucleosynthesis) refers to the production of nuclei
other than H-1, the normal, light hydrogen, during the early phases of the universe, shortly after the  Big
Bang. Due to the high energies during Big Bang, free protons and neutrons would routinely combine
and separate from each other. A series of nuclear fusion reactions took place which is believed to be
responsible for the formation of light elements such as Hydrogen (H), its isotope deuterium (H-2 or D)
and tritium (H-3 or T); the Helium (He) element and its isotopes He-3 and He-4; and a very tiny bit of
other elements like Lithium (lithium isotope Li-7) and Beryllium.
The total process lasted for about 17 minutes. 20 minutes after the universe began to expand,
the universe had cooled to the extent that nuclear fusion process was NO longer taking place. Big Bang
Nucleosynthesis was incapable to produce heavier atomic nuclei such as those necessary to build
human bodies or a planet like the earth because process did not contain enough heat to create the
heavier elements. Instead, those nuclei were formed in the interior of stars and other Nucleosynthesis
methods. https://www.thoughtco.com/stellar-nucleosynthesis-2699311

Much later on, electrons started to bind to ionized protons and nuclei forming neutral atoms in a
process called recombination. The bound particles no longer scattered photons so light and energy
moved freely across space. The period was hence known as the “dark ages”. Gravity caused the atoms to
collapse onto one another to form stars and galaxies and eventually, other matter. This still happens
until today. Space also keeps on expanding at an accelerating rate, thus increasing the distance between
the matters inside it. The Big Bang became a theory that also explains the continuous expansion of the
universe.
STELLAR NUCLEOSYNTHESIS: FORMATION OF HEAVIER ELEMENTS IN STARS

As the cloud of cosmic dust and gases from the Big Bang cooled, stars formed, and these then
grouped together to form galaxies. The universe continuously expanded for several years and the cloud
of hydrogen and helium gases condensed to form stars, including the sun. Hydrogen and helium atoms
in stars began combining in nuclear fusion reactions which resulted in the formation of nuclei of new
elements. It also becomes the star’s source of energy. As the fusion happens, it emits an enormous
amount of light, heat, and radioactive energy which causes stars to burn. These reactions inside stars are
known as stellar nucleosynthesis.
The first person to suggest that nuclear fusion were taking place in stars was Arthur Eddington.
Over millions of years, the stars made of hydrogen become hotter and denser. During this stellar
evolution, nuclear reactions continued, which produced elements heavier than lithium. The light
elements combined to form atoms of carbon, neon, oxygen, silicon, and iron.
Stellar Nucleosynthesis is the process by which elements are created within stars by combining
the protons and neutrons together from the nuclei of lighter elements. Starting from a small, young,
yellow star, successive nuclear reactions occurred until it became a giant red star. The reactions involved
in the formation of each new element happened in regions or layers so called fusion shells. As more
elements were produced, new layers added up to the size of the star until it became a red giant.
In all stars, nuclear fusion converts hydrogen into helium. In stars less massive than the Sun, this
is the only reaction that takes place. In stars more massive than the Sun (but less massive than about 8
solar masses), further reactions that convert helium to carbon and oxygen take place in successive
stages of stellar evolution. In the very massive stars, the reaction chain continues to produce elements
like silicon up to iron.

Reaction Cycles During The Synthesis (Formation) Of Heavy Elements In Stars

Hydrogen Burning: The first stage begins with the proton-proton cycle where hydrogen is
converted to helium. This process occurs in the hydrogen core of stars with a temperature of less than
15 million Kelvin. This process dominates in stars that have similar mass to the sun. When the energy is
sufficient to overcome the Electrostatic or Coulomb Repulsion Forces (force exerted by particles with
similar signs) among protons, the fusion takes place. On the other hand, in stars more massive than the
sun, Carbon-Nitrogen-Oxygen cycle (CNO) dominates. This cycle uses carbon-nitrogen-oxygen elements
as catalysts (compound that is added to a process to make a chemical reaction happen more quickly) in
order to fuse four protons--- and produce an alpha particle, two neutrinos, and two positrons. After the
cycle of reactions, the result is the formation of helium nucleus.
Once enough helium is produced, **these nuclei become concentrated at the core of the star,
making the temperature hotter at the region. Hydrogen continues to fuse, but now in the surrounding
shell of the helium core. When the core reached the temperature enough for helium fusion to occur,
helium burning began. The outer temperature then become colder than the core, which causes the star
to become red.
 Helium Burning: The second stage begins after most hydrogen is burned. Helium burning is done
either through the Alpha Process or the Triple Alpha Process. In the triple alpha process, three alpha
particles or “Helium-4 nuclei” fuse to form a carbon nucleus. As soon as carbon is present, the alpha
process begins where the formation of neon, oxygen, and silicon takes place.

The helium fusion could also produce Beryllium. Once, helium fuse with beryllium it forms carbon.
The beryllium can also be unstable, so it either decays or form carbon. The carbon nuclei produced
became more concentrated at the centre of the star, like what happened to helium earlier**. This
produced a carbon core. When it reached a certain temperature to allow carbon fusion, it produced
neon within the carbon fusion shell.

Neon then become concentrated at the core, then undergo fusion to produce oxygen. When
oxygen become concentrated at the core, nuclear fusion continued producing silicon. The fusion of
silicon produced a radioactive Nickel, which then decayed to iron.

If the star is massive, another set of nuclear fusion reaction begins where carbon, neon, oxygen and
silicon is burned that lead to the formation of heavier elements and finally iron.

More nuclear fusions happened between different nuclei to form the other elements. However, the
production of elements stopped when iron was formed. Since iron is the most stable nuclei, it cannot
undergo nuclear fusion. In all of the previous reactions, a great amount of energy is produced, enough
to fuel more nuclear reactions. However, in order to produce elements heavier than iron, energy input
is necessary. At this point, the star has already exhausted its nuclear fuel.

SUPERNOVA NUCLEOSYNTHESIS: FORMATION OF ELEMENTS HEAVIER THAN IRON

After the star produces iron and the red giant star exhausted the nuclear fuel of light elements,
its core started to collapse to a neutron star or black hole that eventually led to the explosion of the
star. This violent explosion is called supernova. Supernova explosion releases a huge amount of nuclear
energy and produced elements heavier than iron, through neutron capture and radioactive decay. In
neutron capture, heavier isotopes are produced while in proton capture, heavier element nuclei are
produced.
Neutron capture reactions are process wherein a seed nucleus capture neutrons. When this
happens heavier isotopes of the elements are formed that are either stable or radioactive. Stable
isotopes continued to capture neutrons and formed other heavier isotopes of the seed nuclei.
Unstable or radioactive isotopes, however, underwent beta decay, producing an isotope of a new
element.
Neutron capture reactions were either as fast as a fraction of a second or as slow as a few
million years. For seed nuclei with relatively few neutrons (from iron to bismuth), neutron capture
occurred so slowly that beta decay of the product isotope happened before it captured another
neutron. This is now referred to as the slow process or s-process. In other series, neutron capture
occurred very fast that seed nucleus turned into a relatively heavier nucleus before beta decay took
place. Such process is referred to as the rapid process or r-process, which is exemplified in the
formation of cobalt (Co) from iron (Fe).
Different isotopes and much heavier elements were formed during the neutron capture-and-
decay processes. Proton capture also happens where element nuclei are produced. All these elements,
along with the fragments of the star during supernova, were released into the vast space and gradually
condensed to form the different planets like Earth, new stars, and other heavenly bodies.

Other Types of Nucleosynthesis

Cosmic Ray Spallation- during this process, the heavier nuclei of carbon or oxygen fragments (divides)
into lighter elements such as Beryllium, Boron and Lithium, making these elements more abundant
compared to the ratios that result from other type of Nucleosynthesis.