A team of physicists at Michigan State University (MSU) is conducting an investigation into microscopic dust grain that may have emitted from stellar explosions that took place before the formation of the sun. The particles of stardust were found from a meteoritic material on earth. The investigation could lead to new insight into our galaxy.

The research is being conducting in the university's National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory (NSCL), which aims to know whether those extra tiny particles have ejected from classical nova explosions or not. A classical nova is a cataclysmic nuclear explosion on a white dwarf, which causes sudden brightness of the star. It is believed to occur on the surface of white dwarf in a binary system.

It is thought that this nova explosion might have discharged stellar material in the form of dust and gas into space between stars in the galaxy. And some part of this gas and dust would have contributed in formation of our galaxy. This belief has compelled researchers to explore these dust particles.

According to Christopher Wrede, spokesperson for the study and an assistant professor of physics at MSU, there is cosmic recycling process, which starts when star dies. On dying, a star ejects dust and gas that gets recycled to form new planets and stars.

Wrede and his associates conducted an experiment at the NSCL wherein they created and studied exotic radioactive nuclei that have strongest influence on production of silicon isotopes in a series of novae.

They found that pre-solar grains contain strange amounts of isotope silicon-30, an isotope that is quite rare on Earth. However, still they are unaware about how dust particle came to form as they do not know much about rates of nuclear reaction during stellar explosion, which would have indicted how much of silicon-30 was created.

Usually a way to study classical nova for long has been through telescopes, but Wrede believes using new technique of scrutinizing pre-solar grains could be an ideal way for investigation. “If you can actually hold a piece of the star in your hand and study it in detail, that opens a whole new window on these types of stellar explosions”, said Wrede.