Is cosmic dust the magic ingredient?
It’s becoming clear that cosmic dust has played a galactic role in the birth of both stars and galaxies thanks to new supercomputer simulations by astrophysicists. Above, this simulation illustrates galaxy formation occurring early in the history of the universe. Yellow dots are young stars. Blue fog shows the neutral gas. Red surface indicates molecular gas. The starry background has been added for aesthetic effect.
New research based on the simulations helps explain why stars formed more slowly in the early history of the universe than they did much later.
“Early on, galaxies didn’t have enough time to produce a lot of dust, and without dust it’s very difficult to form these stellar nurseries,” says Andrey Kravtsov, associate professor in astronomy and astrophysics at the University of Chicago. “They don’t convert the gas as efficiently as galaxies today, which are already quite dusty.”
Full story at Futurity.
Photo credit: Nick Gnedin, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
