![]() ![]() “We discovered that, at a certain threshold of initial metal content in the gas, stars will stop sending more metals into the Universe over their lifetime,” Cinquegrana says. ![]() ![]() Her paper uses modelling from the earlier paper to study the chemical output of metal-rich stars. “Introducing just a tiny bit more metal into the stars’ gas has really large implications on their evolution,” says Giulia Cinquegrana. These objects affect us directly as around half of the carbon and all elements heavier than iron are synthesised by stars like our Sun.Ībout 90 per cent of all the lead on Earth, for example, was made in low-mass stars which also produce elements such as strontium and barium.īut this ability to produce more metals changes depending on the composition of a star at its birth. These “metal-rich” stars, like our Sun, spew out their products into space, enriching the composition of the galaxy over time. “Over time, the stars that came after the Big Bang produce heavier elements.” “We know the first two elements of the periodic table – hydrogen and helium – were created in the Big Bang,” says Amanda Karakas, first author of a paper studying metal-rich stars. ![]() They are based at Monash University, the Australian National University (ANU), and the Space Telescope Science Institute. The authors are all members of ASTRO 3D, the ARC Centre of Excellence for All Sky Astrophysics in 3 Dimensions. Two new papers published in MNRAS shed light on how the youngest generation of stars will eventually stop contributing metals back to the universe. But what stars produce changes over time. Stars are giant factories that produce most of the elements in the Universe – including the elements in us, and in the Earth’s metal deposits. Image: Many stars in the centre of the Milky Way have high heavy metal content. ![]()
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