Birth of a Star

This site tells the story of the history of the universe. Click Earlier and Later to follow the story.
Note: Many facts have been simplified to make them easier to understand.
Our new free weekly podcast Time Crystal tells this story as sci-fi fantasy

The squashing of the gas and dust as it enters a spiral arm of the Galaxy makes new stars form all the time. The gas collects in cold dark clouds like the one shown here, and stars form inside it, often in groups of several tens of stars. It is unfortunate that star birth happens in these cloudy cocoons, because they make it difficult for us to watch what is happening. In particular we cannot tell how easy it is for planets to form around new stars.

For information on the nearest star to us, click here.

Figure 1