This week's paper was "Dust Formation in a Galaxy with Primitive Abundances," Sloan et al., Science, 323, 353 (2009). It deals with observations of a carbon-rich star in the Sculptor Dwarf Spheroidal galaxy, a satellite of the Milky Way with a metal abundance 0.04 solar. Dwarf galaxies provide a useful laboratory for studying stellar evolution in low-metallicity environments similar to those in the early universe. The paper shows that not only can carbonaceous dust be formed out of the stellar outflow of a metal-poor, carbon-rich star, but that the amount of carbon available for dust condensation may actually be higher than that in stars in more metal-rich environments.
Presentation by Brian Williams can be found here: