WWW.ASTRONOMY.COM 45A glimpse behind the
dusty veil of nebulae
reveals the chemistry
of the universe.
BY DAVID J. EICHER
AND BRIAN MAY;
STEREO IMAGES BY
J.-P. METSÄVAINIO
he universe is a
magical place. Many
people don’t know
this; they are born,
go through their lives,
and perish without
ever realizing it.
I’m not talking about magic the way
you might think. The universe is not a
supernatural place. It’s not full of tricks.
There are no violations of the natural
order of the cosmos, no validity in amu-
lets, curses, spells, miracles, or occultism.
Rather, the universe is a place domi-
nated by natural magic — by nature’s
own laws that make it an amazing won-
der in itself. The truth about the universe
is far stranger and more incredible than
the petty imaginary stories we concoct
every day on our little blue planet Earth.
The universe’s
building blocks
Consider the very stuff you’re made
from, for example. The average human
has 7 octillion atoms in their body. That’s
7 times 10 to the 27th power. Put another
way, it’s 7 billion billion billion atoms.
Suffice to say, it’s a lot. These very same
atoms were created in the early stages of
the universe or in the bellies of exploding