The Sun makes Helium is often misleading since the first element made in stars has to have a neutron made before any "building" can begin. Thus more correctly it should be said that the Sun makes 'NEUTRONS'. Heavy hydrogen that has one proton and one neutron is the first building block on the road to Helium-4 also known as an alpha particle.This process can be easily shown by introducing quarks in the makeup of the hydrogen atom's protons and neutrons. It's surprising that the first step is so confusing and often neglected and overlooked altogether in chemistry education.The next element considered will be the carbon-12 atom that is "fused" in larger hotter stars (again misleading when its told that red stars are cooler...on the surface but the cores can be in the 100 million degree range needed for the triple-alpha process required for carbon synthesis, whereas only about 15 million degrees is suitable for neutron synthesis exhibited in our Sun). Lastly some interesting trends will be shown to be found in the chart of the nuclides for element abundances.

Elemental nucleogenesis is made simple with cartoon drawings of the quarks making hydrogen's protons and neutrons continuing on in heavier elements showing interesting trends in the chart of the nuclides

253rd National Meeting (2017)

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