Related papers: From the cosmological Li problem to the Galactic L…
The formation and evolution of light elements in the Universe act as important cosmological constraints. It has long been assumed that the oldest stars of the Galaxy display the primordial Li abundance in their outer layers, although…
We reconstruct the history of the cosmic star formation as well as the cosmic production of metals in the universe by means of detailed chemical evolution models for galaxies of different morphological types. We consider a picture of…
We discuss the production of the element $^6$Li in the early Galaxy by cosmic rays accelerated at structure formation shocks, driven by the hierarchical merging of sub-Galactic halos during Galaxy formation. The salient features of this…
We study the temporal evolution of the 7Li abundance in the gaseous medium for all the components (halo, disk and bulge) of our Galaxy. We adopt nucleosynthesis prescriptions on stellar lithium production based upon recent observational…
The history of the formation and evolution of the Milky Way Galaxy is found in the spatial distribution, kinematics, age and chemical abundance distributions of long-lived stars. From this fossil record one can in principle extract the star…
The first stars are believed to have formed a few hundred million years after the big bang in so-called dark matter minihalos with masses ~10^6 M_sun. Their radiation lit up the Universe for the first time, and the supernova explosions that…
The existence of K giant stars with high Li abundance continues to challenge the standard theory of stellar evolution. All recent extensive surveys in the Galaxy show the same result: about 1 % of the mainly normal slow rotating K giants…
The earliest generation of stars, far from being a mere novelty, transformed the universe from darkness to light. The first atoms to form after the Big Bang filled the universe with atomic hydrogen and a few light elements. As gravity…
Precise studies on the Galactic bulge, halo, thick disk, and globular clusters require stellar models with alpha enhancement and various He contents. For this purpose we complement existing PARSEC (PAdova-TRieste Stellar Evolution Code)…
The cosmological Li problem is the observed discrepancy between Li abundance, A(Li), measured in Galactic dwarf, old and metal-poor stars (traditionally assumed to be equal to the initial value A(Li)_0), and that predicted by standard Big…
Lithium rich stars in globular clusters are rare. In fact, only 14 have been found so far, in different evolutionary phases from dwarfs to giants. Different mechanisms have been proposed to explain this enhancement, but it is still an open…
The source of the Galactic Lithium (Li) has long been a puzzle. With the discovery of Li in novae, extensive research has been conducted. However, there still exists a significant disparity between the observed abundance of lithium in novae…
I review the subject of the cosmological evolution of galaxies, including different aspects of growth in disk galaxies, by focussing on the angular momentum problem, mergers, and their by-products. I discuss the alternative to merger-driven…
Interstellar dust is a significant component of matter in the galaxies. The dust owns its origin and reprocessing in a wide range of astrophysical environments. In order to understand the origin and evolution of the distinct types of…
At early times the Universe was filled up with an extremely dense and hot gas. Due to the expansion it cooled below the binding energies of atoms which led to the formation of the first nuclei. In the physical environment of the…
We examine the evolution of Li in the Galactic disk,basing our model on the compilation of Li v.Fe observations in stars of iron abundance ranging between halo values,which give a baseline for the disk Li abundance,and 0.2 dex above…
The cosmological {7Li problem consists in explaining why the primordial Li abundance, as predicted by the standard Big Bang nucleosynthesis theory with constraints from WMAP and Planck, is a factor of 3 larger than the Li abundance measured…
The emergence of the first sources of light at redshifts of z ~ 10-30 signaled the transition from the simple initial state of the Universe to one of increasing complexity. We review recent progress in our understanding of the formation of…
One of the main challenges in cosmology is to quantify how small density fluctuations at the recombination epoch z around 1000 evolved into the galaxies and the large-scale structure we observe in the universe today. This thesis discusses…
Observations have revealed that most stars are born in clusters. These systems, containing from tens to thousands of stars and typically significant mass in gas in the youngest systems, evolve due to a combination of stellar and star-gas…