A star cluster some 80,000 light-years from Earth looks mysteriously deficient in the element lithium, just like nearby stars, astronomers reported on Wednesday. That curious deficiency suggests that astrophysicists either dont fully understand the big bang, they suggest, or else dont fully understand the way that stars work. (See interactive story Cosmic Questions.) The discovery, slated for publication in an upcoming issue of Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, doesnt threaten the basic idea of the big bang—that is, that the cosmos began in a state of enormous heat and density, then expanded and evolved into the universe of stars and galaxies we see today. (Related: Big Bang Discovery Opens Door to the Multiverse.) ~Kyle B news.nationalgeographic/news/2014/09/140910-space-lithium-m54-star-cluster-science/?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Social&utm_content=link_fb20140911news-lithium&utm_campaign=Content&sf4580403=1
Posted on: Thu, 11 Sep 2014 12:00:00 +0000
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