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The next time you look out the window for inspiration, keep in mind that the material you are looking at has been forged inside the heart of an exploding ancient star.
An international team of scientists said Friday they detected silica – the main component of the glass – in the remnants of two distant supernovae billions of light-years away from Earth.
The researchers used NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope to analyze the light emitted by the mega-cluster collapsing and get the fingerprint of silica based on the specific wavelength of light that the material is supposed to emit.
A supernova occurs when a big star burns its own fuel, causing a catastrophic collapse ending in an explosion of galactic proportions. It is in these heavenly vortices that individual atoms merge to form many common elements, including sulfur and calcium.
Silica represents about 60% of the earth's crust and a particular form, quartz, is a major ingredient of sand.
In addition to glass windows and fiberglass, silica is also an important part of the industrial concrete recipe.
"We have shown for the first time that the silica produced by the supernovae is large enough to contribute to dust throughout the universe, including the dust that eventually formed our planet," said Haley Gomez, of the Cardiff University.
"Whenever we look out a window, walk on the sidewalk or set foot on a sandy beach, we interact with materials made from exploded stars that have burned millions of years. "
In 2016, scientists announced they found traces of lithium – a metal used in the manufacture of many modern electronic products – at the heart of the explosion of the nova, a phenomenon that occurs when a dwarf star White absorbs the hydrogen from a near sun.
The study was published in Monthly Notices from the Royal Astronomical Society.
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