This volume contains the updated and expanded lecture notes of the 37th
Saas-Fee Advanced Course organised by the Swiss Society for Astrophysics
and Astronomy. It offers the most comprehensive and up to date review of
one of the hottest research topics in astrophysics - how our Milky Way
galaxy formed. Joss Bland-Hawthorn & Ken Freeman lectured on Near Field
Cosmology - The Origin of the Galaxy and the Local Group. Francesca
Matteucci's chapter is on Chemical evolution of the Milky Way and its
Satellites. As designed by the SSAA, books in this series - and this one
too - are targeted at graduate and PhD students and young researchers in
astronomy, astrophysics and cosmology. Lecturers and researchers
entering the field will also benefit from the book.