Primordial nucleosynthesis

Nucleosynthesis is the process by which chemical elements and their isotopes are formed. The heavy elements (carbon and heavier ones) are thought to be the result of thermonuclear burning in stars, and especially the relatively rare stars that become supernovae. Big Bang nucleosynthesis generated fe...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inNew astronomy reviews Vol. 43; no. 2; pp. 185 - 200
Main Authors Signore, Monique, Puy, Denis
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Elsevier B.V 1999
Subjects
Early Universe
Nucleosynthesis
01.30
Early Universe
Nucleosynthesis
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Summary:Nucleosynthesis is the process by which chemical elements and their isotopes are formed. The heavy elements (carbon and heavier ones) are thought to be the result of thermonuclear burning in stars, and especially the relatively rare stars that become supernovae. Big Bang nucleosynthesis generated few elements: only hydrogen, deuterium, some of the helium and lithium, traces (if any) of beryllium and boron. After a brief overview of the physical processes involved therein, we present the predictions of the primordial nucleosynthesis in the standard Big Bang model and compare them to the abundances of the primordial light elements as derived from observational data.
ISSN:1387-6473
1872-9630
DOI:10.1016/S1387-6473(99)00011-1