All stars are different. Each of them has its own character. His own “personality.” However, THE MECHANISM OF NATURE that has triggered the birth of most of those we can observe is always the same, so, in some way, we can consider that All are related. The stars are born from clouds of dust and gas that are disseminated by the universe, and that began to form Shortly after the Big Bangwhich took place, according to the estimates of scientists, almost 14,000 million years ago.
The analyzes that many research groups are carrying out defend that the first stars were born shortly after the formation of the universe. In fact, it is currently considered that the oldest known, whose name resists me to transcribe because it is a cluster of letters and numbers that will not contribute anything, was born nothing less than 13.6 billion years, which reflects that it is almost as old as the universe itself. A team of astronomers from the National University of Australia, which is the group of scientists responsible for its discovery, assures which is sixty times larger than our sun and is located in our same galaxy, the Milky Way, but to 6,000 light years from the earth. Just to a jump.
Our protagonist is the oldest molecule known in the cosmos
The most interesting thing is that, despite their age, astronomers are convinced that there are even more archaic stars. This suspicion relies on the fact that our 13.6 billion giant is composed, in addition to hydrogen, carbon, magnesium and calcium. These chemical elements have necessarily had to be previously manufactured by one or several stars of an even older generation and with a very low presence of metals, understanding as metals all those elements that are heavier than helium, regardless of their position in the periodic table.
The problem is that the knowledge that astrophysics have about these primal stars is still very limited, although this scenario seems to be about to change. And it is that a research team of the Max Planck Institute of Nuclear Physics, which is housed in Heidelberg (Germany), has identified unexpected behavior of helium hydride (heh⁺), which is the oldest molecule known in the cosmos. It consists of a helium atom (He) and a proton (H⁺), and astrophysicists believe it was formed in the universe shortly after the Big Bang, when the temperature was reduced enough so that the helium and hydrogen atoms began to join.
Astrophysics of the Max Planck Institute of Nuclear Physics have managed to reproduce the conditions of the original universe using a cryogenic storage ring
One of the reasons why helium hydride is so important is that its appearance triggered the beginning of chemical bonds in the universe and strengthened the foundations for the creation of molecular hydrogen (H₂), which is the fuel that feeds the stars. The strategy used by astrophysicians from the Max Planck Institute of Nuclear Physics to recreate how this molecule behaved just after the Big Bang is amazing. And they have managed to reproduce the conditions of the original universe using a cryogenic storage ring.
This experimental ingenuity is used to store ion beams for prolonged periods of time at extremely low temperatures and under ultra -oral vacuum conditions. This allows scientists to study the properties of molecules as unstable as helium hydride without being destroyed very quickly when colliding. As explained in the very interesting article that these astrophysicians have published in Astronomy & AstrophysicsDuring their experiment they realized that instead of slowing down as the temperature dropped, the reaction between helium hydride and the deuterium remained constant.
This finding is important because in the primal universe helium hydride interpreted a leading role in the primordial gas cooling process. This cooling was essential so that the clouds of dust and gas collapse under the effects of gravity and give rise to the formation of the stars. In short, what these scientists have discovered is that Helio hydride had a much more active role in the primary chemistry of the universe of what was believed so far. Taking this idea as a starting point, astrophysicists onwards will be able to rethink the theoretical models that describe the processes involved in the formation of the oldest stars.
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