Cheryl Jane Kettles, age 8, of Ottawa, Ont., for her question:

What are the stars made of?

The stars are blazing fires pouring out their light in all directions. Their energy is atomic energy, somewhat like the power of our hydrogen bomb. Their temperatures range up to many millions of degrees and their materials are in the form of gas.

The star we know best is our own glorious sun. Its shining surface is about 6,000 degrees Centigrade. Its seething heart may be 20 million degrees Centigrade. And we know that the sun is made from an assortment of gases. There is hydrogen and there is helium. There are atoms of iron, calcium and carbon. In fact most of the chemical elements on earth have been discovered in the sun.

Our sun and all the stars, it seems, are made of the same basic elements of which our world is made. They are, however, turned to gases in the terrific heat. The atoms cannot combine to form molecules and some are even stripped of their electrons. The planets, the sun, the stars and everything in the universe are made of the same hundred odd chemical elements which make up our solid, everyday earth.