Access
To read this story in full you will need to login or make a payment (see right).
Letters to Nature
Nature 428, 625-627 (8 April 2004) | doi:10.1038/nature02474; Received 19 December 2003; Accepted 9 March 2004
Open Innovation Challenges
-
Protect Enzyme from In Planta Degradation
A proposal for stable expression of an enzyme in corn seed is desired.
-
Efficient Chromosome Doubling: Plant Cell Division
The Seeker is looking for an efficient chromosome doubling method in plants and in particular, metho...
nature jobs
Academic Surgical Pathologist
- Vanderbilt University
- Nashville, Tennessee, USA
Scientist (2 positions)
- Philip Morris International (PMI)
- Singapore
The star-formation history of the Universe from the stellar populations of nearby galaxies
Alan Heavens1, Benjamin Panter1, Raul Jimenez2 & James Dunlop1
- Institute for Astronomy, University of Edinburgh, Blackford Hill, Edinburgh EH9 3HJ, UK
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Pennsylvania, 209 South 33rd Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-6396, USA
Correspondence to: Alan Heavens1 Email: afh@roe.ac.uk
Abstract
The determination of the star-formation history of the Universe is a key goal of modern cosmology, as it is crucial to our understanding of how galactic structures form and evolve. Observations1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 of young stars in distant galaxies at different times in the past have indicated that the stellar birthrate peaked some eight billion years ago before declining by a factor of around ten to its present value. Here we report an analysis of the 'fossil record' of the current stellar populations of 96,545 nearby galaxies, from which we obtained a complete star-formation history. Our results broadly support those derived from high-redshift galaxies. We find, however, that the peak of star formation was more recent—around five billion years ago. We also show that the bigger the stellar mass of the galaxy, the earlier the stars were formed, which indicates that high- and low-mass galaxies have very different histories.
To read this story in full you will need to login or make a payment (see right).
MORE ARTICLES LIKE THIS
These links to content published by NPG are automatically generated.
NEWS AND VIEWS
Cosmology The case of the missing ellipticalsNature News and Views (27 Nov 1997)
An old galaxy in a young UniverseNature News and Views (13 Jun 1996)
See all 17 matches for News And ViewsRESEARCH
Suppression of dwarf galaxy formation by cosmic reionizationNature Letters to Editor (18 May 2006)
Tracing the first stars with fluctuations of the cosmic infrared backgroundNature Article (03 Nov 2005)
See all 55 matches for Research
