JWST & HST: Galaxy cluster MACS0416 with Mothra - a star with 4000x magnification

[AVAO]

Webb, Hubble Combine to Create Most Colourful View of
Universe / Galaxy cluster MACS0416 with Mothra pullout
NASA/ESA | NASA/ESA | 2023 Nov 09

Image credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, J. Diego (Instituto de Física de Cantabria, Spain), J. D’Silva (U. Western Australia), A. Koekemoer (STScI), J. Summers & R. Windhorst (ASU), and H. Yan (U. Missouri).

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The NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope and the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have united to study an expansive galaxy cluster known as MACS0416. The resulting panchromatic image combines visible and infrared light to assemble one of the most comprehensive views of the Universe ever obtained. Located about 4.3 billion light-years from Earth, MACS0416 is a pair of colliding galaxy clusters that will eventually combine to form an even bigger cluster. ...more

This image of galaxy cluster MACS0416 highlights one particular gravitationally lensed background galaxy, which existed about 3 billion years after the big bang. That galaxy contains a transient, or object that varies in observed brightness over time, that the science team nicknamed “Mothra.” Mothra is a star that is magnified by a factor of at least 4,000 times. The team believes that Mothra is magnified not only by the gravity of galaxy cluster MACS0416, but also by an object known as a “milli-lens” that likely weighs about as much as a globular star cluster. ...more


Zoomable: https://esawebb.org/images/weic2327b/zoomable/
Video: https://esawebb.org/videos/weic2327a/

TY4YA Jac

[AVAO]

Webb, Hubble Combine to Create Most Colourful View of
Universe / Galaxy cluster MACS0416 with Mothra pullout
NASA/ESA | NASA/ESA | 2023 Nov 09

Interesting x-shaped feature ... in comparison with NGC 4710 or NGC 1175.

Click to view full size image

Cutout Credit: NASA/ESA (HST)

Hubble view of galaxy NGC 4710 with x-shaped bulge:

Click to view full size image

Credit: NASA/ESA (HST)

Hubble’s celestial peanut (NGC 1175):

Click to view full size image

https://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/ima ... illars.png
Credit: NASA/ESA (HST)

[scholarlyvex]

Webb, Hubble Combine to Create Most Colourful View of
Universe / Galaxy cluster MACS0416 with Mothra pullout
NASA/ESA | NASA/ESA | 2023 Nov 09

Interesting x-shaped feature ... in comparison with NGC 4710 or NGC 1175.

Click to view full size image

Cutout Credit: NASA/ESA (HST)

Hubble view of galaxy NGC 4710 with x-shaped bulgesnake io:

Click to view full size image

Credit: NASA/ESA (HST)

Hubble’s celestial peanut (NGC 1175):

Click to view full size image

https://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/ima ... illars.png
Credit: NASA/ESA (HST)

One specific gravitationally lensed background galaxy, which existed approximately 3 billion years after the big bang, is highlighted in this image of galaxy cluster MACS0416. The scientific team gave the item in that galaxy the moniker "Mothra" because it is transient, or has an observable brightness that changes over time. This is an excellent way to get information.

[Ann]

Webb, Hubble Combine to Create Most Colourful View of
Universe / Galaxy cluster MACS0416 with Mothra pullout
NASA/ESA | NASA/ESA | 2023 Nov 09

Interesting x-shaped feature ... in comparison with NGC 4710 or NGC 1175.

Click to view full size image

Cutout Credit: NASA/ESA (HST)

Hubble view of galaxy NGC 4710 with x-shaped bulgesnake io:

Click to view full size image

Credit: NASA/ESA (HST)

Hubble’s celestial peanut (NGC 1175):

Click to view full size image

https://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/ima ... illars.png
Credit: NASA/ESA (HST)

One specific gravitationally lensed background galaxy, which existed approximately 3 billion years after the big bang, is highlighted in this image of galaxy cluster MACS0416. The scientific team gave the item in that galaxy the moniker "Mothra" because it is transient, or has an observable brightness that changes over time. This is an excellent way to get information.

Note that the galaxy marked with a red circle is an ordinary, if strongly barred, galaxy. It is not extremely far in the background, and it has not been lensed as seen from our perspective.

This is Mothra:

Image credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, J. Diego (Instituto de Física de Cantabria, Spain), J. D’Silva (U. Western Australia), A. Koekemoer (STScI), J. Summers & R. Windhorst (ASU), and H. Yan (U. Missouri).

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ESA wrote:

Among the transients the team identified, one stood out in particular. Located in a galaxy that existed about 3 billion years after the Big Bang, it is magnified by a factor of at least 4000. The team nicknamed the star system Mothra in a nod to its ‘monster nature’, being both extremely bright and extremely magnified. It joins another lensed star that the researchers previously identified and that they nicknamed Godzilla. Both Godzilla and Mothra are giant monsters known as kaiju in Japanese cinema.

Interestingly, Mothra is also visible in the Hubble observations that were taken nine years earlier. This is unusual, because a very specific alignment between the foreground galaxy cluster and the background star is needed to magnify a star so greatly. The mutual motions of the star and the cluster should have eventually eliminated that alignment.

The most likely explanation is that there is an additional object within the foreground cluster that is adding more magnification. The team was able to constrain its mass to be between 10 000 and 1 million times the mass of our Sun. The exact nature of this ‘milli-lens’, however, remains unknown. It is possible that the object is a globular star cluster that’s too faint for Webb to observe directly.

Ann