A new study suggests that carbon, essential for life, may travel beyond our galaxy after being created in stars. After stars die, they disperse carbon and other elements into vast 'halos' surrounding galaxies. These halos act like cosmic conveyor belts, transporting material out and back into galaxies, where it can form planets, asteroids, and new stars.
The carbon that is a key component of the human body—and all other lifeforms on Earth—may have traveled outside the galaxy after being created before returning on a cosmic 'conveyor belt,' an author of a new study has suggested.Carbon is a chemical element, widely distributed in nature, and is essential to life as we know it.
'The heavy elements that stars make get pushed out of their host galaxy and into the circumgalactic medium through their explosive supernovae deaths, where they can eventually get pulled back in and continue the cycle of star and planet formation.
Astrophysics Cosmology Carbon Cycle Star Formation Planetary Science
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