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Universal Big Bang Lithium Deficit Confirmed
An anonymous reader writes New observations of the star cluster Messier 54 show that it is just as deficient in lithium as our own galaxy, furthering a mystery about the element's big bang origins. "Most of the light chemical element lithium now present in the Universe was produced during the Big Bang, along with hydrogen and helium, but in much smaller quantities. Astronomers can calculate quite accurately how much lithium they expect to find in the early Universe, and from this work out how much they should see in old stars. But the numbers don't match — there is about three times less lithium in stars than expected. This mystery remains unsolved, despite several decades of work."
No it wouldn't.
"Astronomers can calculate how much lithium they expect to find in the early Universe".
What part of the words "they expect" are you finding difficult to understand? Adding "believe they" is tautological. Their expectations are based not on "their experience with other elements" but on a model. If the expectations are wrong, as they seem to be, then the model is wrong. That model is more than just BBN, but all of it should be questioned. However, this implication is contained in "they expect". That expectation is based on some assumptions. Those assumptions seem to be incomplete or inaccurate.
That the models predict an amount of lithium with narrow error bars.
It's a really neat prediction, it just happens not to agree with the measurements.
Well, I might have a way, but it only works on a semi spherical planet in a vacuum.