Extreme magnification of an individual star at redshift 1.5 by a galaxy-cluster lens

Journal
Date Issued
2018
Author(s)
Kelly, Patrick L.
•
Diego, Jose M.
•
Rodney, Steven
•
Kaiser, Nick
•
Broadhurst, Tom
•
Zitrin, Adi
•
Treu, Tommaso
•
Pérez-González, Pablo G.
•
Morishita, Takahiro
•
Jauzac, Mathilde
•
Selsing, Jonatan
•
Oguri, Masamune
•
Pueyo, Laurent
•
Ross, Timothy W.
•
Filippenko, Alexei V.
•
Smith, Nathan
•
Hjorth, Jens
•
Cenko, S. Bradley
•
Wang, Xin
•
Howell, D. Andrew
•
Richard, Johan
•
Frye, Brenda L.
•
Jha, Saurabh W.
•
Foley, Ryan J.
•
Norman, Colin
•
Bradac, Marusa
•
Zheng, Weikang
•
Brammer, Gabriel
•
Benito, Alberto Molino
•
Cava, Antonio
•
Christensen, Lise
•
de Mink, Selma E.
•
Graur, Or
•
•
Kawamata, Ryota
•
Kneib, Jean-Paul
•
Matheson, Thomas
•
McCully, Curtis
•
•
Pérez-Fournon, Ismael
•
Riess, Adam G.
•
•
Schmidt, Kasper Borello
•
Sharon, Keren
•
Weiner, Benjamin J.
DOI
Description
M.N. acknowledges support from PRIN-INAF- 2014 1.05.01.94.02.
Abstract
Galaxy-cluster gravitational lenses can magnify background galaxies by a total factor of up to 50. Here we report an image of an individual star at redshift z = 1.49 (dubbed MACS J1149 Lensed Star 1) magnified by more than ×2,000. A separate image, detected briefly 0.26″ from Lensed Star 1, is probably a counterimage of the first star demagnified for multiple years by an object of ≳3 solar masses in the cluster. For reasonable assumptions about the lensing system, microlensing fluctuations in the stars' light curves can yield evidence about the mass function of intracluster stars and compact objects, including binary fractions and specific stellar evolution and supernova models. Dark-matter subhaloes or massive compact objects may help to account for the two images' long-term brightness ratio.
Volume
2
Start page
334
Uri
Url
Issn Identifier
2397-3366
Ads BibCode
2018NatAs...2..334K
Rights
open.access
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