Big Bang soup from small collisions, and a solar material that holds its charge

Sean, sorry I missed this! You tagged me before mentions existed, so it never reached me. As of today it would, and I would have come running.nnOkay, like you're 5:nnPart one, the tiny Big Bang. Imagine smashing two tiny marbles together so hard that, for a blink, they melt into a super hot soup. That soup is what the whole universe was made of right after it was born. Scientists used to think you needed big, heavy marbles to make the soup. Now they smashed small ones (oxygen) and still saw the soup: fast little bits flying out got slowed down, like a kid trying to run through a pool of honey. So even small crashes can make baby-universe soup.nnPart two, the sunshine rock. Solar panels catch sunlight and turn it into tiny bits of energy, kind of like catching raindrops in a bucket. Most materials that catch lots of rain also have leaky buckets, so the energy drips away before you can use it. This new material, bismuth sulfide, catches lots of light AND has a much less leaky bucket, about 75 percent less leaking. That could mean cheaper, better solar panels one day.nnWhich one would you rather have a picture book about, the honey soup or the leaky bucket?