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Universal Big Bang Lithium Deficit Confirmed

Posted by samzenpus on from the would-you-like-to-try-another-alkali-metal? dept.

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."

21 of 171 comments (clear)

  1. Simple explanation. by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 5, Funny

    Elon Musk has cornered the supply of lithium for his giga factory. That man thinks centuries ahead of rest of the world and pundits! Man! Morgan cornering silver is nothing compared to this heist.

    --
    sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
    1. Re:Simple explanation. by FatdogHaiku · · Score: 5, Funny

      All of existence is bi-polar and has needed the lithium just to maintain it's current state...

      --
      You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
  2. Mined by other civilizations by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Civilizations more advanced than our own understood that electric vehicles were the way to go, and they mined it all.

  3. Depressing News by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    This is really depressing news. :-(

    1. Re:Depressing News by geogob · · Score: 4, Funny

      I'm sure there's two side to this story.

    2. Re:Depressing News by HuguesT · · Score: 5, Funny

      We should not be polarized about it.

    3. Re:Depressing News by drainbramage · · Score: 5, Funny

      Stop blaming obama for failures he clearly inherited from previous administrations.

      --
      No brain, no pain.
    4. Re:Depressing News by Charliemopps · · Score: 3, Funny

      This is really depressing news. :-(

      I'm so happy because today I've found my friends, They're in my head.

    5. Re:Depressing News by RatherBeAnonymous · · Score: 3, Funny

      All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh-water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?

    6. Re:Depressing News by Talderas · · Score: 3, Funny

      Subjugate the gauls.

      --
      "Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
  4. Lithium, huh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    No wonder the universe is so mentally unbalanced.

  5. Quite accurately? by The+Mysterious+Dr.+X · · Score: 2, Interesting

    "Astronomers can calculate quite accurately how much lithium they expect to find in the early Universe," can they? How do they know it's accurate? What control values are they using?

    It's not entirely semantic, either; it goes on to say, "But the numbers don't match."

    So how is that "quite accurate"?

    1. Re:Quite accurately? by AikonMGB · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I believe they meant "precisely", not "accurately". Their theories make a prediction which has error bars on it; the measurements taken have error bars on them; the error bars do not overlap.

    2. Re:Quite accurately? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      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.

    3. Re:Quite accurately? by Charliemopps · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "Astronomers can calculate quite accurately how much lithium they expect to find in the early Universe," can they? How do they know it's accurate? What control values are they using?

      It's not entirely semantic, either; it goes on to say, "But the numbers don't match."

      So how is that "quite accurate"?

      You're being a pedant.

      Let me rephrase for you: Using our current model of the big bang, scientists come up with 3x as much lithium as is measured. Therefor the model likely needs adjusting or there is something about the post big-bang that we do not quite understand.

      By accurate they mean this measurement directly contradicts the model. There is no way for an error in the calculation to account for the difference.

    4. Re:Quite accurately? by geogob · · Score: 2, Insightful

      To say you can calculate quite accurately an expected value makes no sense a all. I can only understand that they estimate the value using models and believe these models to be accurate. Any other signification is senseless and it would be pointless to argue over it.

      Furthermore, you can't asses the accuracy of an estimation with a model. The model is, as you point it yourself out, what gives the estimated value. Only a measurement can validate the estimation and the model.
      Their models gave prediction for the other elements and observations showed that the model was pretty much spot on. Using the same approach for Li, they assumed (or hope for) a similar accuracy. Observation now show that it wasn't the case.

      But the point of the statement was that the believed it would be accurate (again, because any other interpretation of the sentence makes no sense at all). If it is not based on other results using the same model or technique, how do you believe they would have that confidence on the accuracy of their expectation?

  6. Re:I'm sure this is just poor wording... by Neil+Boekend · · Score: 3, Informative

    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.
  7. Three times less = negative number! by KreAture · · Score: 2

    Stop saying three times less! It is wrong!
    You can find one thirds as much as you expected, but not three times less.

    Three times less means something has to be multiplied by 3 and subtracted.
    X - 3X = -2X!

    It is both gramatically and mathmatically incorrect.
    Stop it!

    1. Re:Three times less = negative number! by Njovich · · Score: 2

      In English, this is one of the terms used for division. Deal with it.

  8. I thought this was solved by Korn et al. by Prune · · Score: 4, Interesting

    http://www.nature.com/nature/j... Can any astro-types chime in on this?

    --
    "Politicians and diapers must be changed often, and for the same reason."
  9. Re:another one of these, huh? by ChromaticDragon · · Score: 2

    You have to keep in mind that planets are pretty much negligible from a mass balance sheet of anything larger than a stellar system. In our solar system, the Sun makes up between 99.8% and 99.9% of the mass in our solar system.

    I imagine you could pretty much presume all planets to be solid lithium and it wouldn't change much with regards to a 3-fold discrepancy.