Earendel, The Farthest Star Ever Found Is NOT a Star At All
Revisiting Earendel: Why Scientists Now Believe It Is a Star Cluster, Not a Single Star
Discover why the object once hailed as the most distant star, Earendel, likely represents an ancient cluster instead. This revision updates cosmology and reveals what the potential new record-holding individual stars might be.
Short Summary
- The initial premise that Earendel is an individual star proved incorrect after new James Webb data analyzed its size and spectra.
- New lensing models incorporating dark matter suggest Earendel spans several light-years, fitting the profile of a globular cluster.
- Researchers are now focusing on two other candidates (Star 1 and Star 2) potentially confirmed as the farthest individual stars.
Anton corrects previous reporting, detailing how updated spectroscopic analysis of Earendel, combined with revised gravitational lensing models, strongly points toward it being a massive star cluster formed early in the universe, not a singular star.
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Top Comments (10)
I hope those two stars are called after the two trees Laurelin and Telperion.
"Earendel, The Farthest Star Ever Found Is NOT a Star At All" Yes thats right. Its a flying sailing ship with a Silmaril on its bow
One of the things that I’m most excited to learn when I’m doing astronomy and astrophysics is learning how we can distinguish these kinds of details about objects in very deep space from such a small sample size of data to work with. Like how you can deduce that a star in a gravitational lens is actually a binary system, that’s crazy to me and I think it’s gonna be really fun
It's very interesting to know globular clusters go back that far... it suggests they are their own thing and not the remains of something else, ruling out a few possibilities.
So many billions of light years away. Wonder what these objects are now. Supernovae, black holes, neutron stars in a sea of red dwarf stars waiting out the end of the universe?
Wonderful as always Anton. Thank you. 🙂
Just imagine how many objects are invisibly among those we can see through lensing, it must be immense.
James webb keeps on giving
Thanks for breaking down the science behind Earendel's discovery!
i love the nerdy names that scientists use to name things
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Top Comments (10)
I hope those two stars are called after the two trees Laurelin and Telperion.
"Earendel, The Farthest Star Ever Found Is NOT a Star At All" Yes thats right. Its a flying sailing ship with a Silmaril on its bow
One of the things that I’m most excited to learn when I’m doing astronomy and astrophysics is learning how we can distinguish these kinds of details about objects in very deep space from such a small sample size of data to work with. Like how you can deduce that a star in a gravitational lens is actually a binary system, that’s crazy to me and I think it’s gonna be really fun
It's very interesting to know globular clusters go back that far... it suggests they are their own thing and not the remains of something else, ruling out a few possibilities.
So many billions of light years away. Wonder what these objects are now. Supernovae, black holes, neutron stars in a sea of red dwarf stars waiting out the end of the universe?
Wonderful as always Anton. Thank you. 🙂
Just imagine how many objects are invisibly among those we can see through lensing, it must be immense.
James webb keeps on giving
Thanks for breaking down the science behind Earendel's discovery!
i love the nerdy names that scientists use to name things