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Hubble peers through cosmic lens to capture most distant star ever seen

The discovery of the star, which astronomers often refer to as Icarus rather than by its formal name, MACS J1149 Lensed Star 1 (LS1), kicks off a new technique for astronomers to study individual stars in galaxies formed during the earliest days of the universe. These observations can provide a rare look at how stars evolve, especially the most luminous ones.

"For the first time ever we're seeing an individual normal star – not a supernova, not a gamma ray burst, but a single stable star – at a distance of nine billion light years," said Alex Filippenko, a professor of astronomy at UC Berkeley and one of many co-authors of the report. "These lenses are amazing cosmic telescopes."

The astronomy team also used Icarus to test and reject one theory of dark matter – that it consists of numerous primordial black holes lurking inside galaxy clusters – and to probe the make-up of normal matter and dark matter in the galaxy cluster.

Also at NASA.

See also: SN Refsdal

Extreme magnification of an individual star at redshift 1.5 by a galaxy-cluster lens (open, DOI: 10.1038/s41550-018-0430-3) (DX)

Original Submission