The Magic Furnace: The Search for the Origins of Atoms by Marcus Chown
THE MAGIC FURNACE tells of how astronomers and nuclear physicists deduced where the elements in our bodies come from is one of the greatest detective stories in the history of science. In fact, it is two stories intertwined: the story of atoms and the story of stars. Neither story can be told without the other. For the stars contain the key to unlocking the secret of atoms and the atoms the solution to the puzzle of the stars.