The Early Epochs of the Milky Way Galaxy

Our team will discover and analyse the oldest, most metal-poor stars in the Milky Way Galaxy. These objects were among the first to form in the Universe and hold keys to understanding how the chemical elements formed in the first stars, the nature of those objects and how our Galaxy formed 13 billion years ago. Utilizing two comprehensive surveys, we shall find objects from the dawn of time (with metal abundances less than 1/10,000 that of the Sun, of which only three are known), and examine in exquisite detail the structure and origins of the oldest populations in our Galaxy.