The First Water in the Universe

Primordial (or Pop III) supernovae were the first great nucleosynthetic engines of the universe,
expelling the first heavy elements required for the later formation of planets and life into the early IGM.
With new capabilities in the Enzo adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) code we are uniquely positioned
to model the formation of the first water in the universe in Pop III SN remnants at redshifts z ~ 20.
The Ph.D. project we envision is to first simulate the formation of water in individual SN explosions
and then later evolve multiple SN systems to study how they congregate into primitive galaxies in
Enzo. The eventual goal will be to model the buildup of dust and water in primeval galaxies to study
the conditions of the formation of the first planets.