Most elements exist as a result of stars smashing atoms as per my understanding.
In a single star the heaviest element you can make is Iron.
To get anything heavier than Iron, which Lead is, you need your first start to blow up making iron, and the stuff left behind to eventually form a bigger star, then that star needs to blow up (where you’ll get some gold, lead and a few other slightly heavier elements. Then the remaining parts of the star need to form a neutron star. You then need that neutron star to find and eventually crash into another neutron star, and thats where you get the really heavy elements like uranium.
In a single star the heaviest element you can make is Iron.
To get anything heavier than Iron, which Lead is, you need your first start to blow up making iron, and the stuff left behind to eventually form a bigger star, then that star needs to blow up (where you’ll get some gold, lead and a few other slightly heavier elements. Then the remaining parts of the star need to form a neutron star. You then need that neutron star to find and eventually crash into another neutron star, and thats where you get the really heavy elements like uranium.
So does that imply that Lead has existed in the universe strictly longer than Uranium? Is the meme entirely backwards?
I think it could, yes. Not much (more comes out in the neutron star on neutron star action), but yes some from single large start explosions.