Home | Contact us | Follow Toco Touch on Facebook Follow Toco Touch on Twitter Follow Toco Touch on Rss

Friday, September 2, 2011

Found a star that shouldn't exist!



Team of European astronomers discovered for the first time a star in our galaxy that theoretically should not exist, because it consists almost entirely of hydrogen and helium and contains minor amounts of other heavier chemical elements and minerals. The unusual recommendation that puts the "forbidden zone", based at least what is known about star formation, but which perhaps should be revised now.


The discovery, led by Elizabeta Cafu Observatory of Paris and the Centre for Astronomy, University of Heidelberg, which appeared in the journal "Nature", was made using the Very Large Telescope of the European Southern Observatory in Chile.

The very faint star in the constellation Leo, according to the measurements so far, has the least amount of chemical elements heavier than helium (ie metals) than any other star has been studied so far. The ratio of metal inside is at least 20,000 times smaller than that of our sun. Its mass is less than our own sun and its age is estimated to be over 13 billion years, ie very old.


Another strange thing is though that this lightweight star has no virtually no lithium, whereas in an ancient star, with a composition similar to that of the universe shortly after the "Big Bang" should be a greater quantity. It is thus a mystery what happened to lithium. Scientists do not preclude finding other such strange stars and are already planning future investigations.

No comments:

Post a Comment