<p>The Sun is actually a <strong>THIRD</strong> generation star. What I mean by this is that there are chemical elements in the Sun that were made inside another star, but that star itself can only have made those elements because it had material in it that must also have been made inside previous, second generation stars. Eventually we get back to the first generation stars, born out of primordial gas from the big bang that contained almost no heavy elements (those beyond helium) at all.</p>

<p>That is quite a mouthful, so let me explain using an example - barium.</p>

<p>There is barium in the Sun. We can tell that by looking at the spectrum and seeing absorption lines due to barium. But barium cannot be made in the Sun. The barium is made via the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-process" rel="noreferrer">s-process</a>, which involves the slow capture of neutrons onto the nuclei of iron-peak elements. This happens during the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asymptotic_giant_branch" rel="noreferrer">asymptotic red giant branch phase</a> of stellar evolution, and the Sun has 6 billion years or so before it gets to that point. [NB: not even half the abundance of chemical elements beyond iron are produced by supernovae explosions$^1$.]</p>

<p>So, before the Sun, there must have existed a star - probably an intermediate mass star - which evolved to become a giant, made barium in its interior, then lost its envelope through a massive wind into the interstellar medium, and that material was incorporated into the protosun. Such stars (between, say, 2 and 10 solar masses) would have much shorter lifetimes than the Sun$^2$, so plenty of time for them to live and die before the Sun was born.</p>

<p>But wait a minute! That previous star must have <em>already</em> had iron-peak elements in its interior to act as a "seed" for the s-process production of barium. These were not and could not be made inside that star. They must have been made in a previous star, probably a massive star, that burned through all the nuclear fusion stages before exploding as a supernova, casting heavy elements, including iron-peak elements, into the interstellar medium. This previous star could also have had its own (metal-rich) ancestors, but ultimately as we go back in time we reach a point where the previous star was a <em>first</em> generation star, made from primordial H/He gas, with almost no heavy elements. These first generation (a.k.a. population III stars, just to be confusing) were probably very massive and short lived - a few million years. They would be born when the universe was a few hundred million years old and we can see no examples of them in our Galaxy today.</p>

<p>To try and define more precisely what I mean by "generation".</p>

<ul>
<li>First generation - made from primordial big bang material.</li>
<li>Second generation - a star made only from the detritus of dying first    generation stars, enriched in heavy elements but lacking in primary s-process elements.</li>
<li>Third generation - a star made from material already enriched in heavy elements and including elements that are produced in the s-process inside previous second (or third) generation stars.</li>
</ul>

<p>So that is why I claim the Sun can be classed as a "third generation star" - it contains atoms/nuclei that must have been inside <em>at least</em> two previous stars.</p>

<p>But you should not take this too literally. There are grains of material trapped inside meteorites that consist of solids that were already present in the pre-solar material. These are important because these grains were thought to have formed in <em>individual</em> stellar events and their isotopic compositions can be studied. These tell us that the Sun formed from material that has been inside <em>many</em> different stars of different types.</p>

<p>Stellar evolution and nucleosynthesis calculations tell us the same story. For example, whilst most of our oxygen was made in massive stars that underwent a core collapse supernova, such events do not produce that much carbon. The C/O ratio tells us that most of our carbon comes via the winds from intermediate mass AGB stars. Heavy elements like uranium may be dominantly produced in neutron star collisions, but others like barium and strontium are not.</p>

<p>The details of how many ancestors have contributed to the Sun has no simple answer. Much of the solar hydrogen and helium could be pristine; some will have been through more than one star. Heavier elements (bar some lithium) will have been through at least one star. The fact that we have s-process elements like Ba, Sr, La and Ce, which are formed by neutron capture onto iron-peak elements, tells us those have been through <em>at least</em> two stars. </p>

<p>However, these are <em>vast</em> underestimates. Mixing in the interstellar medium is reasonably effective. The material spewed out from supernovae and stellar winds 5-12 billion years ago has had plenty of time to mix throughout the Galaxy before the Sun's birth. Turbulence and shear instabilities, driven by the winds and supernovae from massive stars, should distribute material on galactic-length scales in a billion years or less (<a href="http://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1995A%26A...294..432R" rel="noreferrer">Roy &amp; Kunth 1995</a>; <a href="http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0208441" rel="noreferrer">de Avillez &amp; Mac Low 2003</a>), though local inhomogeneities associated with nearby recent events can persist over $10^{8}$ years. If this is the case, then the Sun is the product of the $\sim$ billion stars that died before it was born.</p>

<p>The reason you are confused with your lifetime argument is that you have ignored the possibility of the Sun being made from stars that lived <em>at the same time</em> in different parts of the Galaxy. The material that they ejected near the end of their lives has just been thoroughly mixed up.</p>

<p>$^1$ The rest are produced by the s-process in intermediate mass AGB stars; through nova events on white dwarfs; or perhaps, in the case of the heavier elements, through the collision of neutron stars (see <a href="https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/7131/origin-of-elements-heavier-than-iron-fe?lq=1">this Physics SE question</a>).</p>

<p>$^2$ A rough expression for the lifetime of a star is $10 (M/M_{\odot})^{-5/2}$ billion years.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-21T19:39:37.737Z
That makes more sense. Maybe it was just the way they worded it that made it confusing. That and timescales of this magnitude are difficult to comprehend.
Benjam
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-21T23:27:58.410Z
So if I'm reading this correctly, the sun is part of the third generation of starts, but it has millions of parents, and millions of grandparents? (Each parent a direct ancestor, with no intermediate stars)
Leliel
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-21T23:41:10.820Z
@Leliel It is third generation because it contains atoms/nuclei that must have been inside *at least* two other stars. Indeed it has (at least) millions of parents. But the concept of grandparent is ill-defined. The stars that fed into the parent stars were unlikely to be "first generation" stars themselves. I realise there is something additional I need to make clear. The very first generation of stars had no heavy elements inside them.
ProfRob
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-21T23:46:33.080Z
@RobJeffries Not a perfect analogy then. I think the concept of parent of parent star (grandparent) is well defined, it's any star that contributed mass to the parent star. Unlike with humans, a grandparent star isn't required to be an earlier generation than a parent, just not a later generation? Because if the grandparent was a later generation, it is likely some of the mass contribution to the parent would contain some elements not possible in earlier generations of star?
Leliel
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-22T15:40:17.883Z
Considering the OP goes on a bit about lifespan of stars and the universe,  I think that going into a bit of detail about the lifespans of the stars from different generations would be useful.
Shane
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-23T02:55:16.673Z
@Shane The lifetimes of "first generation", otherwise known as "Population III" stars, is still conjectural, as that generation of stars is still mostly a theoretical prediction.  The broad stroke is that higher metallicity makes smaller (cooler) stars easier to form, and a warmer interstellar medium makes larger stars easier to form, so low metallicity + warm medium in the early universe leads us to expect stars to be very large, and so very short lived.  But models and observations tend to differ.  Some expect average masses of 20-130 $M_{\odot}$, while others expect several hundred.
zibadawa timmy
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-23T09:15:01.513Z
"we can see no examples of them today." -- depending what you mean by "today" and how much confidence you want :-) My understanding is that CR7 is believed to contain at least one region of Population III stars observed by VLT. It's 13bn ly away, meaning either that this distant part of the universe is only a few hundred million years old today, or else that we're observing something that doesn't exist, depending on your attitude to simultaneity.
Steve Jessop
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-23T09:15:01.727Z
@zibadawatimmy Either ofwhich means the stars live for the "blink of an eye" in cosmic terms, and then explode, so it doesn't really matter.
ProfRob
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-25T07:01:44.180Z
Is there a way to, know based on current theory and/or models, what percentage of each isotope in the interstellar medium is formed from the s-process or the r-process or the alpha process or via other processes? For instance, if most oxygen-16 in the ISM originated from supernovae, was it formed by the alpha process in the star prior to or by some other process during the supernova?
dualredlaugh
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-25T08:20:29.343Z
@dualredlaugh that would make an excellent question. It is largely a theoretical business, though of course measurements in AGB stars and supernova remnants can be made. The answer to your last Q is prior to.
ProfRob
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-25T14:43:12.710Z
Why is carbon not released from type II supernovae? Prior to the shock wave, there are carbon and helium burning shells around the core which could be blown off. Is the carbon consumed from shock wave nucleosynthesis? If so, why does the same process not occur for oxygen?
dualredlaugh
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-25T15:41:50.013Z
@dualredlaugh New question. Carbon is not absent. It also depends a lot on the mass and metallicity of the progenitor.
ProfRob
CC BY-SA 4.0
2016-06-21T17:23:39.693Z
2018-07-05T18:28:12.877Z
2018-07-05T18:28:12.877Z
ProfRob
<p>I've heard from a few sources<sup>*</sup> recently that the Sun is a 1,000th generation star, meaning it had a thousand stars that came before it based on its heavy-element content.</p>

<p>I understand that earlier stars' supernovae created the heavier elements and those were incorporated into the Sun when it formed and we can calculate the generation based on that. </p>

<p>My question is based on the age of the universe and the age of the Sun and the average age of stars in the galaxy.</p>

<p>Basically, the universe is ~13.7 billion years old, the sun is ~4.6 billion years old (and has ~5 billion years of life left), which means it was formed when the universe was ~9.1 billion years old.</p>

<p>For 1,000 stars to live in that span of time, those stars would have to have an average lifespan of ~9 million years (not including time between stars). This equates to each of those thousand stars having an average mass of ~100-150 solar masses so their lives would be sufficiently short to not go over that ~9 million-year lifetime.</p>

<p>So basically, there were 1,000 stars that lived and died before our Sun, all of which were huge monsters. This just all seems so improbable. How can this be?</p>

<p><sup>* TV shows, I don't remember which ones</sup></p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-22T14:31:38.040Z
Related question on [physics.se]: [How many times has the “stuff” in our solar system been recycled from previous stars?](http://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/3769/how-many-times-has-the-stuff-in-our-solar-system-been-recycled-from-previous-s)
dmckee --- ex-moderator kitten
<the-sun><stellar-evolution>
How can there be 1,000 stellar ancestors before our Sun?
Benjam
# How can there be 1,000 stellar ancestors before our Sun?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2016-06-21)

I've heard from a few sources\* recently that the Sun is a 1,000th generation star, meaning it had a thousand stars that came before it based on its heavy-element content.

I understand that earlier stars' supernovae created the heavier elements and those were incorporated into the Sun when it formed and we can calculate the generation based on that.

My question is based on the age of the universe and the age of the Sun and the average age of stars in the galaxy.

Basically, the universe is ~13.7 billion years old, the sun is ~4.6 billion years old (and has ~5 billion years of life left), which means it was formed when the universe was ~9.1 billion years old.

For 1,000 stars to live in that span of time, those stars would have to have an average lifespan of ~9 million years (not including time between stars). This equates to each of those thousand stars having an average mass of ~100-150 solar masses so their lives would be sufficiently short to not go over that ~9 million-year lifetime.

So basically, there were 1,000 stars that lived and died before our Sun, all of which were huge monsters. This just all seems so improbable. How can this be?

\* TV shows, I don't remember which ones

**Tags:** the-sun, stellar-evolution

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Related question on [physics.se]: [How many times has the “stuff” in our solar system been recycled from previous stars?](http://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/3769/how-many-times-has-the-stuff-in-our-solar-system-been-recycled-from-previous-s)  

---

## 1 answers

### Answer by username_2 on 2016-06-21. Score: 177 | Accepted answer

The Sun is actually a **THIRD** generation star. What I mean by this is that there are chemical elements in the Sun that were made inside another star, but that star itself can only have made those elements because it had material in it that must also have been made inside previous, second generation stars. Eventually we get back to the first generation stars, born out of primordial gas from the big bang that contained almost no heavy elements (those beyond helium) at all.

That is quite a mouthful, so let me explain using an example - barium.

There is barium in the Sun. We can tell that by looking at the spectrum and seeing absorption lines due to barium. But barium cannot be made in the Sun. The barium is made via the [s-process](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-process), which involves the slow capture of neutrons onto the nuclei of iron-peak elements. This happens during the [asymptotic red giant branch phase](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asymptotic_giant_branch) of stellar evolution, and the Sun has 6 billion years or so before it gets to that point. [NB: not even half the abundance of chemical elements beyond iron are produced by supernovae explosions$^1$.]

So, before the Sun, there must have existed a star - probably an intermediate mass star - which evolved to become a giant, made barium in its interior, then lost its envelope through a massive wind into the interstellar medium, and that material was incorporated into the protosun. Such stars (between, say, 2 and 10 solar masses) would have much shorter lifetimes than the Sun$^2$, so plenty of time for them to live and die before the Sun was born.

But wait a minute! That previous star must have *already* had iron-peak elements in its interior to act as a "seed" for the s-process production of barium. These were not and could not be made inside that star. They must have been made in a previous star, probably a massive star, that burned through all the nuclear fusion stages before exploding as a supernova, casting heavy elements, including iron-peak elements, into the interstellar medium. This previous star could also have had its own (metal-rich) ancestors, but ultimately as we go back in time we reach a point where the previous star was a *first* generation star, made from primordial H/He gas, with almost no heavy elements. These first generation (a.k.a. population III stars, just to be confusing) were probably very massive and short lived - a few million years. They would be born when the universe was a few hundred million years old and we can see no examples of them in our Galaxy today.

To try and define more precisely what I mean by "generation".

* First generation - made from primordial big bang material.
* Second generation - a star made only from the detritus of dying first generation stars, enriched in heavy elements but lacking in primary s-process elements.
* Third generation - a star made from material already enriched in heavy elements and including elements that are produced in the s-process inside previous second (or third) generation stars.

So that is why I claim the Sun can be classed as a "third generation star" - it contains atoms/nuclei that must have been inside *at least* two previous stars.

But you should not take this too literally. There are grains of material trapped inside meteorites that consist of solids that were already present in the pre-solar material. These are important because these grains were thought to have formed in *individual* stellar events and their isotopic compositions can be studied. These tell us that the Sun formed from material that has been inside *many* different stars of different types.

Stellar evolution and nucleosynthesis calculations tell us the same story. For example, whilst most of our oxygen was made in massive stars that underwent a core collapse supernova, such events do not produce that much carbon. The C/O ratio tells us that most of our carbon comes via the winds from intermediate mass AGB stars. Heavy elements like uranium may be dominantly produced in neutron star collisions, but others like barium and strontium are not.

The details of how many ancestors have contributed to the Sun has no simple answer. Much of the solar hydrogen and helium could be pristine; some will have been through more than one star. Heavier elements (bar some lithium) will have been through at least one star. The fact that we have s-process elements like Ba, Sr, La and Ce, which are formed by neutron capture onto iron-peak elements, tells us those have been through *at least* two stars.

However, these are *vast* underestimates. Mixing in the interstellar medium is reasonably effective. The material spewed out from supernovae and stellar winds 5-12 billion years ago has had plenty of time to mix throughout the Galaxy before the Sun's birth. Turbulence and shear instabilities, driven by the winds and supernovae from massive stars, should distribute material on galactic-length scales in a billion years or less ([Roy & Kunth 1995](http://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1995A%26A...294..432R); [de Avillez & Mac Low 2003](http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0208441)), though local inhomogeneities associated with nearby recent events can persist over $10^{8}$ years. If this is the case, then the Sun is the product of the $\sim$ billion stars that died before it was born.

The reason you are confused with your lifetime argument is that you have ignored the possibility of the Sun being made from stars that lived *at the same time* in different parts of the Galaxy. The material that they ejected near the end of their lives has just been thoroughly mixed up.

$^1$ The rest are produced by the s-process in intermediate mass AGB stars; through nova events on white dwarfs; or perhaps, in the case of the heavier elements, through the collision of neutron stars (see [this Physics SE question](https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/7131/origin-of-elements-heavier-than-iron-fe?lq=1)).

$^2$ A rough expression for the lifetime of a star is $10 (M/M\_{\odot})^{-5/2}$ billion years.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: That makes more sense. Maybe it was just the way they worded it that made it confusing. That and timescales of this magnitude are difficult to comprehend.  
> **username_3**: So if I'm reading this correctly, the sun is part of the third generation of starts, but it has millions of parents, and millions of grandparents? (Each parent a direct ancestor, with no intermediate stars)  
> **username_2**: @username_3 It is third generation because it contains atoms/nuclei that must have been inside *at least* two other stars. Indeed it has (at least) millions of parents. But the concept of grandparent is ill-defined. The stars that fed into the parent stars were unlikely to be "first generation" stars themselves. I realise there is something additional I need to make clear. The very first generation of stars had no heavy elements inside them.  
> **username_3**: @RobJeffries Not a perfect analogy then. I think the concept of parent of parent star (grandparent) is well defined, it's any star that contributed mass to the parent star. Unlike with humans, a grandparent star isn't required to be an earlier generation than a parent, just not a later generation? Because if the grandparent was a later generation, it is likely some of the mass contribution to the parent would contain some elements not possible in earlier generations of star?  
> **username_4**: Considering the OP goes on a bit about lifespan of stars and the universe,  I think that going into a bit of detail about the lifespans of the stars from different generations would be useful.  
> **username_5**: @username_4 The lifetimes of "first generation", otherwise known as "Population III" stars, is still conjectural, as that generation of stars is still mostly a theoretical prediction.  The broad stroke is that higher metallicity makes smaller (cooler) stars easier to form, and a warmer interstellar medium makes larger stars easier to form, so low metallicity + warm medium in the early universe leads us to expect stars to be very large, and so very short lived.  But models and observations tend to differ.  Some expect average masses of 20-130 $M_{\odot}$, while others expect several hundred.  
> **username_6**: "we can see no examples of them today." -- depending what you mean by "today" and how much confidence you want :-) My understanding is that CR7 is believed to contain at least one region of Population III stars observed by VLT. It's 13bn ly away, meaning either that this distant part of the universe is only a few hundred million years old today, or else that we're observing something that doesn't exist, depending on your attitude to simultaneity.  
> **username_2**: @username_5 Either ofwhich means the stars live for the "blink of an eye" in cosmic terms, and then explode, so it doesn't really matter.  
> **username_7**: Is there a way to, know based on current theory and/or models, what percentage of each isotope in the interstellar medium is formed from the s-process or the r-process or the alpha process or via other processes? For instance, if most oxygen-16 in the ISM originated from supernovae, was it formed by the alpha process in the star prior to or by some other process during the supernova?  
> **username_2**: @username_7 that would make an excellent question. It is largely a theoretical business, though of course measurements in AGB stars and supernova remnants can be made. The answer to your last Q is prior to.  
> **username_7**: Why is carbon not released from type II supernovae? Prior to the shock wave, there are carbon and helium burning shells around the core which could be blown off. Is the carbon consumed from shock wave nucleosynthesis? If so, why does the same process not occur for oxygen?  
> **username_2**: @username_7 New question. Carbon is not absent. It also depends a lot on the mass and metallicity of the progenitor.  

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