Can we identify the generation of any star?

[bostonnew]

Hi all,

I would love if someone could clarify these five questions for me:

1. Is it correctly understood that all stars are of a certain generation?

2. Which generation is the sun?

3. What is the highest generation star we know of?

4. In the Milky Way, what is the share of first generation stars vs. second generation vs. third generation etc.? What is the relative share of these within our local cluster or even for the universe?

5. Are all our nearby stars siblings to our sun? Or do we have cousins nearby (i.e. stars that evolved from another supernova explosion than our sun's parent)? Do any siblings to our sun's parent still exist?

THANKS

 

[Drakkith]

1. Not really. Stars are constantly being born and dying, and each has a different lifetime. Some last for only a few million years, while some last for 10+ billion. The Population type of a star doesn't mean anything about its generation. See here for more on that: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metallicity