Physics Main Calendar

Because primordial stars are composed only of the few light elements synthesized during the Big Bang, their energy generation and nucleosynthesis may be somewhat altered compared to later generations of stars like our Sun. Spectral observations of early stars are recent lead us to new discoveries and it is expected that observations from the James Webb Space Telescope will lead to many more. I'll discuss recent results for the 19F(p,g)20Ne reaction that explain calcium abundance observations in one of the oldest observed stars to date, the Keller star, as well as an idea for some alternative methods to bridge the mass A=5 and 8 gaps to produce carbon from the Big Bang elements. Experiments at the University of Notre Dame, the Jingping Underground Experiment for Nuclear Astrophysics and the Laboratory for Underground Nuclear Astrophysics have been, or are ongoing, to address these questions from the nuclear physics side.