Earendel (astronomical object)

Earendel, designated WHL0137-LS, is a star cluster or a star located in the constellation of Cetus. Discovered in 2022 with the Hubble Space Telescope, it has a comoving distance of 28 billion light-years (8.6 billion parsecs), making it the most distant known star if it is a single object. The previous farthest known star, MACS J1149 Lensed Star 1, also known as Icarus, at a comoving distance of 14.4 billion light-years (4.4 billion parsecs), was discovered by Hubble in 2018. However, further observations from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) in the 2020s revealed that Earendel is more likely a star cluster. Objects like Earendel can be observed at cosmological distances thanks to the large magnification factors afforded by gravitational lensing, which can exceed 1,000. Other candidates stars have been observed through this technique, such as Godzilla, although controversies remain about their true nature.