Metal-poor stars provide the fossil record of Galactic chemical evolution and the nucleosynthesis processes that took place at the earliest times in the history of our Galaxy .
From detailed abundance studies of low mass , extremely metal-poor stars ( \mathrm { [ Fe / H ] } < -3 ) , we can trace and help constrain the formation processes which created the first heavy elements in our Galaxy .
Here we present the results of a \sim 25-star homogeneously analysed sample of metal-poor candidates from the Hamburg/ESO survey .
We have derived abundances for a large number of elements ranging from Li to Ba , covering production processes from hydrostatic burning to neutron-capture .
The sample includes some of the most metal-poor stars ( \mathrm { [ Fe / H ] } < -4 ) studied to date , and also a number of stars enhanced in carbon .
The so called CEMP ( carbon enhanced metal-poor ) stars , these stars make up \sim 20 % of the stars with \mathrm { [ Fe / H ] } < -3 , and 80 % of the stars with \mathrm { [ Fe / H ] } < -4.5 .
The progenitors of CEMP stars are still not fully constrained ; they could be a result of binary mass transfer or high-mass explosive events in the early universe .