Writing in the Nature Astronomy journal, researchers said about 80 percent of the stars in the Milky Way central region were formed in the earliest years of our galaxy, sometime between eight and 13.5 billion years ago.
For about six billion years after this, few stars were born. But this quiet period was brought to an end by an intense burst of star formation about one billion years ago, it is claimed.
Francisco Nogueras-Lara, who led two new studies of the Milky Way central region while at the Institute of Astrophysics of Andalusia in Granada, Spain said, contrary to what had been accepted up to now, we found that the formation of stars has not been continuous. The conditions in the studied region during this burst of activity must have resembled those in 'starburst' galaxies, which form stars at rates of more than 100 solar masses per year. This burst of activity, which must have resulted in the explosion of more than 100,000 supernovae, was probably one of the most energetic events in the whole history of the Milky Way.
0 Comments