NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has confirmed and expanded upon the Hubble Space Telescope’s discovery of “Earendel”, the most distant star ever observed — shining just one billion years after the Big Bang.

About Earendel: The ‘Morning Star’ of the Early Universe

• Meaning: The name Earendel means “morning star” or “rising light.” 
• Nature: It is a massive B-type star, more than twice as hot as the Sun and nearly one million times more luminous.
• Uniqueness: Unlike most distant stars that blend into their host galaxies, Earendel’s light is individually visible due to a natural cosmic phenomenon — gravitational lensing.
• Location: Earendel lies within the Sunrise Arc galaxy, one of the most strongly magnified galaxies observed from the universe’s first billion years.

Role of Gravitational Lensing in Discovery

• Concept: Gravitational lensing is a phenomenon in which light from a distant celestial object (like a galaxy) is bent by the gravitational field of a massive object (like another galaxy or black hole) lying between the source and the observer.
• This happens because, according to Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity, mass curves spacetime, and light follows this curved path — similar to how a glass lens bends light.

Discovery Mechanism

• Alignment: Earendel’s visibility results from its alignment behind a galaxy cluster named WHL0137-08, located between Earth and the distant star.
• Gravitational Lensing: The cluster’s immense gravity bends and magnifies light from objects behind it — acting as a cosmic magnifying glass.
• Amplification: This natural lensing boosted Earendel’s brightness by over 4,000 times, making it appear as a single bright point that JWST could capture with precision.

Scientific Importance

• Earendel’s Age: It shone 1 billion years after the Big Bang, making it the farthest individual star ever seen.
• Comparative Milestones:
• • Earendel: 1 billion years post–Big Bang.
  • Quyllur (Red Giant) – Detected by Webb: 3 billion years post–Big Bang.
  • Hubble’s earlier records: 4 billion years post–Big Bang.
• Cosmic Insight: Studying Earendel helps scientists understand:
  • Stellar evolution in the early universe.
  • Transition from the “cosmic dark ages” to the formation of the first galaxies.
  • Early chemical composition and metallicity of stars.

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