Astronomers Discover the Farthest Star From Earth
The star is so far away that its light took 12.9 billion years to reach Earth, and it is now seen as it was when the universe was about 900 million years old, a mere 7% of its current age.
Using the Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have discovered the farthest observable star. Scientists have named the celestial body, which was formed almost 13 billion years ago, Earendel, which means "morning star" in old English.
The star is so far away that its light took 12.9 billion years to reach Earth, and it is now seen as it was when the universe was about 900 million years old, a mere 7% of its current age. The mass of the star is 50 times that of the mass of the Sun, and it is millions of times as bright.
The discovery of Earendel will help astronomers explore the early years of the universe.
The record of the farthest observable star previously belonged to a star detected by Hubble in 2018. It existed when the universe was about four billion years old.