Linking dwarf galaxies to halo building blocks with the most metal-poor star in Sculptor

Anna Frebel (), Evan N. Kirby and Joshua D. Simon
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Anna Frebel: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA
Evan N. Kirby: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91106, USA
Joshua D. Simon: Observatories of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, Pasadena, California 91101, USA

Nature, 2010, vol. 464, issue 7285, 72-75

Abstract: Galactic building blocks The discovery last year of an extremely metal-poor star in the Sculptor dwarf galaxy cast doubt on a prevailing view — based on the apparent absence of the most metal-poor stars in present-day dwarf galaxies — that the long-known, classical dwarf satellite galaxies orbiting the Milky Way could not be building blocks of the Galaxy. New observations of this star, S1020549, indicate spectroscopic abundance patterns for 11 elements that are typical of metal-poor 'halo-type' stars. This suggests that the systems destroyed to form the Galactic halo billions of years ago were not fundamentally any different from the progenitors of present-day dwarf galaxies.

Date: 2010
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DOI: 10.1038/nature08772

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