{"id":31795,"date":"2022-05-24T10:16:24","date_gmt":"2022-05-24T10:16:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/?post_type=purple_issue&p=31795"},"modified":"2022-05-24T10:16:24","modified_gmt":"2022-05-24T10:16:24","slug":"hubble-finds-the-farthest-star-ever-seen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/2022\/05\/24\/hubble-finds-the-farthest-star-ever-seen\/","title":{"rendered":"Hubble finds the farthest star ever seen"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
The record-breaking star was found with the help of a chance alignment<\/p>\n\n
This most distant star, Earendel, is positioned in line with a ripple in spacetime that gives the galaxy it lies in extreme magnification <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n
The Hubble Space <\/strong>Telescope has observed what could be the earliest star ever seen, which appears to date from when the Universe was just a billion years old, and is a potential member of the very first primordial generation of stars.<\/p>\n\n
Hubble was only able to spot the star \u2013 called Earendel, meaning \u2018morning star\u2019 in Old English \u2013 because its light was bent and magnified by a foreground galaxy cluster in a process known as gravitational lensing.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cNormally at these distances, entire galaxies look like small smudges, with the light from millions of stars blending together,\u201d says Brian Welch from the Johns Hopkins University, who led the discovery. \u201cThe galaxy hosting this star has been magnified and distorted by gravitational lensing into a long crescent that we named the sunrise arc.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n\n
This alignment made Earendel\u2019s light stand out from the rest of the galaxy, allowing astronomers to see it. Fortunately, this alignment should hold for another few years, meaning the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) can observe the star when it becomes fully operational later this year. Though Hubble has been able to determine the star\u2019s age and that it weighs 50 solar masses, JWST is sensitive enough to learn more about the star\u2019s brightness, temperature and composition as well.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cStudying Earendel will be a window into an era of the Universe that we are unfamiliar with, but that led to everything we do know,\u201d says Welch. \u201cIt\u2019s like we\u2019ve been reading a really interesting book and we started with the second chapter. Now we will have a chance to see how it all got started.\u201d https:\/\/hubblesite.org<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
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