Such is HD 140283, a star similar to the Sun that lies 200 light years from Earth — pretty close as stars go. It's been known for some time to be a special kind of star, one we say is low metallicity. metals for historical reasons) didn't start turning up until massive stars made them in their cores, exploded, and sent them sleeting out into space to get incorporated into newer stars. What this means is that older stars tend to have fewer heavy elements in them, and younger stars have more. We use the Sun as a standard, because why not. By that measure, HD 140283 has a metallicity 1/250