Machine-learning study shows first stars formed in groups.

Researchers at the Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe in Tokyo have used machine learning to study the heavy elements that the first stars in the universe passed on to their immediate successors after they exploded in supernovae. The team found evidence that most of the first generation of stars in the universe existed in systems of two or more stars. The study suggests that the first stars formed in a multiple star system or in a cluster of stars, which was indicated in theoretical simulations, but has never been confirmed with observations before.