Faraway gamma-ray burst reveals what the most ancient galaxies were made of
http://io9.com/5855958/faraway-gamma+ray-burst-reveals-what-the-most-ancient-galaxies-were-made-of
I think this was ‘surprising’ because I don’t think a lot of researchers gave some serious thoughts about how things would have looked in the early universe. Once the universe had cooled off to the point where atoms could form (around 300K years if I recall correctly), the distribution of matter was probably quite uniform (actually, one question has always been how the heck galaxies formed if the matter distribution was so uniform) and I suspect (and would love to be paid to do simulations to know if there is any value in my idea) that once a cloud of gas started to condense it probably pulled from such a huge area that the initial stars formed were probably so huge that they probably had lifespans in the order of a few million years and likely nearly 100% exploded as super novae and it is the super novae that produce all heavy elements (pretty much anything heavier than carbon and the only place to get metals (not metals in the astronomic sense, which includes everything over lithium, but metals like gold, sliver, uranium, etc.)). It was probably the concussions of those explosions (which probably popping off like flashes at the Oscar ceremonies) that caused the pressure waves that lead to the haves and the have nots areas in the universe.
