A quirk of nature that helps magnify extremely distant cosmic objects allowed a space telescope to see a star that existed when the universe was only 900 million years old.
NASA’s Hubble observatory made the discovery in 2022, making it the farthest and earliest star ever seen. Astronomers named it Earendel, meaning “morning star” in Old English.
A year later, scientists followed up with the James Webb Space Telescope because it has a larger mirror and collects light at longer infrared wavelengths. At that point, scientists thought they may have spotted a companion star, something they were surprised was technically possible, even with Webb’s unprecedented power.
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