Our universe is far more mysterious than we can even imagine. Secrets of the universe are stranger than as we know them today. We know that stars have light and the reason behind this light is the high temperature and burning of fuel on their surface and in the cores. Everywhere in the universe, there is one element that you can find easily and yet it is the most important one of the existence for the universe as we know it. Among all the elements in our periodic table, one is the cause of the natural existence of most of the other elements. That element is the most crucial elements of all and this element is hydrogen.
Hydrogen is the simplest element with simple atomic structure. Hydrogen is the reason for our existence. How it is the cause of our existence? Let me explain it to you. Stars burn hydrogen and burning of this hydrogen cause other higher atomic structural elements to form. Hydrogen atoms in fusion reaction on stars are fused together to form helium atoms. When a star completely burns hydrogen then it starts burning helium. Helium atoms are then fused together to form carbon and we know that carbon is an organic compound.
Scientists at CERN are currently studying the conditions created after the Big Bang. When the Universe was formed in the Big Bang, the resultant fundamental matter was about one quarter helium, three quarters hydrogen and a few parts-per-billion of lithium. After first flashes of the big bang universe was very hot and dense, but when it started to cool down the building blocks of matter like electrons and quarks were made.
A few millionths of a second later protons and neutrons were produced. It took a very long time for electrons to be stuck in orbits around nuclei, creating the first atoms. These atoms were mainly helium and hydrogen, and these are still the most abundant elements in the universe. Stars fused hydrogen atoms to form helium and after that higher atoms were started to produce like carbon and iron. This was a little overview of hydrogen in our universe. Hydrogen is also very important for us because it can provide energy far more than any other source so far observed or tested. One use of hydrogen is fusion reaction. In order to fuse two hydrogen atoms it require a huge amount of energy and that is very high temperature. That temperature is present on the Sun. In order to produce energy from hydrogen atoms on earth we require a high temperature. Fusion reaction is the process that powers the main sequence stars. In France scientists are building the first nuclear reactor with the ability of controlled fusion reaction. This fusion reactor has been planned to produce 500 megawatts of output power.
Current age is also known as “The Hydrogen Age”. Once we controlled fusion reaction, then there might be enough energy for all the people on earth to dissipate as much as they can. There are many facts about hydrogen and its importance. Hydrogen and helium make up almost all of the nuclear matter in the Universe. 74% of the mass is comprised by the most plentiful element, hydrogen, and helium accounts 25%. Heavier elements comprise less than 1% of the total. This total mass is just 4% of all the mass of the universe and the remaining is Dark Matter and Dark Energy.
