James Webb Telescope Captures Record 44 Stars in Distant Galaxy Using Gravitational Lensing

Astronomers leveraged the Dragon Arc's magnification to observe individual stars from 6.5 billion light-years away, offering new insights into dark matter and stellar evolution.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) identified 44 individual stars in a distant galaxy, marking the largest such discovery in the distant universe.
The observation was made possible by gravitational lensing, where the galaxy cluster Abell 370 magnified and distorted light from the Dragon Arc galaxy behind it.
Many of the stars identified are red supergiants, whose study could reveal insights into early galaxy formation and chemical diversity in the universe.
This breakthrough demonstrates JWST's unprecedented capability to resolve individual stars in galaxies billions of light-years away, far surpassing previous efforts with the Hubble Space Telescope.
The findings also provide a new opportunity to study dark matter, as gravitational lensing relies on massive, invisible dark matter halos to amplify light.