Where do humans truly originate from?

Stars are giant balls of hydrogen gas. In the very centre of a star it’s hot enough – millions of degrees hot – that a nuclear fusion reaction is going on. Little tiny atoms of hydrogen, the smallest, simplest atom, ram together in a nuclear fusion reaction, and they make bigger and bigger atoms. The star gets energy out of that, and that’s what makes the star shine. The incredible thing is that this is where every atom in the universe comes from, besides the original hydrogen and helium.

Eventually all the hydrogen inside the core is depleted, and then the star dies. Stars like the Sun unravel gently back into space, and all of those wonderful new atoms and elements that it created are being distributed back into space. The death isn’t quite so gentle. In fact, it explodes violently in a supernova explosion. The amazing thing about supernovae, these violent star deaths, is that every atom larger than iron has to be created in this more violent explosion. Iron is the element that makes our blood red; iron combined with oxygen gives you red blood. You better believe – it’s actually true – that whenever I bleed, I think about how the iron that makes my blood red was created the instant the star died. Your

body literally had to be forged inside a star that died.