Monday's gravitational wave observation is astronomical alchemy

Proof that celestial collisions called kilonovas create gold is the first wonder to arise from coordinated observations - expect more to come

If you are wearing a piece of gold jewellery, take a good, hard look at it and consider this: you are likely to be wearing the celestial debris of a cataclysmic stellar collision, a collision so devastating that it literally shook the universe. That's the conclusion from Monday's announcement of gravitational wave signal GW170817.

It is another reminder that we are intimately connected to the cosmos around us. At heart, astronomy is not really about remote and abstracted realms, instead it informs us about our own origins and the origins of those things we value.