Here’s something to think about: the average adult human is made up of-1 (7 octillion) atoms, and most of them are hydrogen — the most common element in the Universe, produced by the Big Bang 13.8 billion years ago.

The rest of those atoms were forged by ancient stars merging and exploding billions of years after the formation of the Universe, and a tiny amount can be attributed to cosmic rays — high-energy radiation that mostly originates from somewhere outside the Solar System.

As astronomer Carl Sagan once said in an episode of Cosmos, “The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.”