A surprising new study reveals that the first stars appeared in a pre-heated universe, challenging earlier ideas about early cosmic conditions.

Astronomers studying how elements heavier than iron were produced in the early Milky Way have identified a distinct series of epochs of galaxy-wide chemical formation. This evolutionary timeline, ...

Besides being a point of light, a star is a luminous, spherical mass of plasma, enough to hold itself together under its own gravity. On its own, though, gravitational rounding isn't enough. What ...

Black holes are among the most intriguing cosmic bodies, but we know little about their origins. The Pop III.1 model explains ...

At just 25, Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin applied quantum physics to a treasure trove of astronomical observations to show that stars are mostly hydrogen and helium.

Chemistry in the first 50 million to 100 million years after the Big Bang may have been more active than we expected.

Some classes of stars create light elements, such as oxygen and silicon; others also craft heavier ones, such as iron and ...

A new article published in The Astrophysical Journal explores a new theory of how Type Ia supernovae, the powerful stellar ...

Stellar size and class diversification originates from the initial mass of the molecular cloud from which stars form. The elemental composition of the molecular cloud, specifically the abundance of ...

When it comes to baby blankets, the fluffier, the better — and astronomers have discovered that some infant stars in the early universe also preferred "fluffy" pre-natal cocoons. Scientists have ...

Gold, uranium, and other heavy elements on Earth did not form here. They were born in the violent deaths of massive stars and the collisions of neutron stars, traveling across the galaxy before ...