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The Webb Telescope captures the image of the most distant star ever seen

The Webb Telescope captures the image of the most distant star ever seen

Astronomers have used the James Webb Space Telescope to observe Earendel, the most distant star ever discovered.

Earendel is so distant that the starlight seen by the Webb telescope was emitted within the first billion years of the universe. The universe is estimated to be about 13.8 billion years old.

Previous estimates suggested the star is 12.9 billion light-years away from Earth, but given the expansion of the universe and how long light has traveled to reach us, astronomers believe Earendel is currently 28 billion light-years away.

The name of the star is derived from the Old English words meaning morning star. The Hubble Space Telescope first discovered Earendel in 2022.

Webb's observations have revealed new insights into the extremely distant star. Earendel is a star 1 million times brighter than our sun and more than twice as hot.

The star is in the Sunrise Arc galaxy and was only observable because a massive galaxy cluster called WHL0137-08 that exists between Earth and Earendel magnified the distant object.