Related papers: Missing cosmic metals revealed by X-ray absorption…
Studying a range of old metal-poor stars provides information over cosmological timescales of our Galaxy. Such studies are indicative of the pristine gases and evolution of the Milky Way. Deriving stellar parameters and abundances from…
The stars in the dwarf spheroidal satellite galaxies (dSphs) of the Milky Way are significantly more metal-poor than would be expected from a closed box model of chemical evolution. Gas outflows likely carried away most of the metals…
The enrichment of the intergalactic medium with heavy elements is a process that lies at the nexus of poorly-understood aspects of physical cosmology. We review current understanding of the processes that may remove metals from galaxies,…
Galaxies are surrounded by extended atmospheres, which are often called the circumgalactic medium (CGM) and are the least understood part of galactic ecosystems. The CGM serves as a reservoir of both diffuse, metal-poor gas accreted from…
Ancient, long-lived stars remain present in all components of our home galaxy, the Milky Way. Born a few hundred million after the Big Bang and during a time that marked the very beginning of the chemical evolution, these stars display very…
In the context of the ``missing metals problem'', the contributions of the UV-selected z=2.2 ``BX'' galaxies and z=2.5 ``distant red galaxies'' (DRGs) have not been discussed previously. Here we show that: (i) DRGs only make a marginal…
We assess the metal content of the cool (10^4 K) circumgalactic medium (CGM) about galaxies at z<1 using an H I-selected sample of 28 Lyman limit systems (LLS, defined here as absorbers with 16.2<log N(H I)<18.5) observed in absorption…
We now have mounting evidences that the circumgalactic medium (CGM) of galaxies is polluted with metals processed through stars. The fate of these metals is however still an open question and several findings indicate that they remain…
The current census of observed baryons in the local Universe is still missing a significant fraction of them according to standard Big-Bang nucleosynthesis. Numerical simulations predict that most of the missing baryons are in a hot…
The distributions of a galaxy's gas and stars in chemical space encodes a tremendous amount of information about that galaxy's physical properties and assembly history. However, present methods for extracting information from chemical…
The metal content of clusters of galaxies and its relation to their stellar content is revisited making use of a cluster sample for which all four basic parameters are homogeneously measured within consistent radii, namely core-excised…
When and how did galaxies form and their metals accumulate? Over the last decade, this has moved from an archeological question to a live investigation: there is now a broad picture of the evolution of galaxies in dark matter halos: their…
To study large-scale structure in the Universe a full census of the contents are required. This is even more important when the processes of galaxy formation are being investigated. In the last year the population of distant galaxies that…
Approximately half of the Universe's dark matter resides in collapsed halos; significantly less than half of the baryonic matter (protons and neutrons) remains confined to halos. A small fraction of baryons are in stars and the interstellar…
Aims. A sample of early B-type stars in OB associations and the field within the solar neighbourhood is studied comprehensively. Present-day abundances for the astrophysically most interesting chemical elements are derived. Methods.…
As galaxies evolve, they must enrich and exchange gas with the surrounding medium, but the timing of these processes and how much gas is involved remain poorly understood. In this work, we leverage metals as tracers of past gas flows to…
Gas inflow feeds galaxies with low metallicity gas from the cosmic web, sustaining star formation across the Hubble time. We make a connection between these inflows and metallicity inhomogeneities in star-forming galaxies, by using…
The first galaxies contain stars born out of gas with little or no metals. The lack of metals is expected to inhibit efficient gas cooling and star formation but this effect has yet to be observed in galaxies with oxygen abundance relative…
X-ray emission is ubiquitous among massive stars. In the last decade, X-ray observations revolutionized our perception of stellar winds but opened a Pandora's box of urgent problems. X-rays penetrating stellar winds suffer mainly continuum…
Clusters of galaxies as the largest clearly defined objects in our Universe are ideal laboratories to study the distribution of the most abundant chemical elements heavier than hydrogen and helium and the history of their production. The…