Experts say it could be from just the second generation of stars after the big bang.
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00:04 The universe is old, around 13.8 billion years old to be exact.
00:08 But while many cosmic objects like stars come and go, they can live for a long time.
00:12 And now researchers believe they have just discovered one of the oldest living stars in the universe.
00:17 Its technical name is S+J210428.01-004934.2, and it's 16,000 light years away.
00:27 So how do astronomers from the National Science Foundation know it's so old?
00:30 Experts analyzed the chemical makeup using cosmic spectrometers,
00:34 finding that it contained elements produced only from first-generation stars.
00:38 But also, it's extremely low in later-generation materials like carbon, iron, oxygen, magnesium, and lithium,
00:44 as early universe composition was less stars and planets and more clouds of helium and hydrogen.
00:49 This discovery not only means this is the first second-generation star we've ever identified,
00:54 but it could also point us in the direction of even older stars,
00:57 perhaps even ones that were created in the first moments of the universe.
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