The ages of (the oldest) stars

TL;DR

This paper reviews methods for determining the ages of the oldest stars, highlighting progress made and ongoing challenges in accurately dating ancient stellar systems and individual stars.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of existing age-dating techniques and discusses unresolved issues affecting age accuracy for the oldest stars.

Findings

Significant progress in stellar age determination methods.

Identification of key issues impacting age accuracy.

Discussion of future challenges in stellar chronometry.

Abstract

Much progress has been achieved in the age-dating of old stellar systems, and even of individual stars in the field, in the more than sixty years since the evolution of low-mass stars was first correctly described. In this paper, I provide an overview of some of the main methods that have been used in this context, and discuss some of the issues that still affect the determination of accurate ages for the oldest stars.