Would it surprise you to learn that a part of you has been to outer space? You may wonder how that can be possible since you've most likely never traveled beyond our planet. US and Canada-based scientists revealed in a recent study published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters that up to 18% of your body (Carbon) has undertaken a massive journey. Along with other atoms thrown into the cosmos when stars die, carbon atoms encircle their galaxy of birth on gigantic currents that span intergalactic space.

While the report did not confirm that this circuitous journey occurs in all of the estimated 2 trillion galaxies, the researchers confirmed that atoms undergo this journey in galaxies where new stars are still forming, like our Milky Way galaxy.

The previous belief was that star-formed atoms like oxygen, iron, and carbon drift idly through the cosmos, waiting to be sucked up for new use in random processes. However, the newly published study has clarified that atoms encircle galaxies on gigantic currents known as circumgalactic mediums.

Describing a circumgalactic medium, a doctoral candidate in the research team at the University of Washington, Samantha Garza, likened it to a giant train station that continually pushes materials in and out.

Explaining the significance of the research, Jessica Werk, a professor at the University of Washington and a co-author of the paper, explained that these results have "exciting implications" for how galaxies form and for understanding the source of the carbon galaxies used to create new stars. She suggested that the carbon in our body has been outside the galaxy.

The study also explained how elements are fused inside the stars and then ejected. These ejections are important because the ejection of carbon and other elements into space disperses them beyond their host galaxies. The circumgalactic medium catches the elements and serves as a reservoir to circulate carbon and other elements back to the galaxies. This process ensures that the elements are not lost but preserved and recycled. Eventually, this continuous cycle led to the formation of planets like the Earth.