#cepheid variable stars

[skylobster]

Cepheid variables have a period that is directly related to their absolute luminosity. So they make a percent t yardstick to measure intergalactic distances.

The day Hubble discovered the Universe.

101 years ago Today, Edwin Hubble took a picture of this Cepheid variable in M31 or the Andromed galaxy.

[transingthoseformers]

Wrote down a little bullshitted up lineage of primes thing as a treat, and I threw in a few of primes for a gap in between Prime Nova and Nova Prime, the latter is in my list as "Nova Prime 2: electric boogaloo" which is hilarious.

The oc primes:

Prime Proxima, Prime Plerion, Caerulus Prime, Cepheidis Prime, Asterism Prime, Luminus Prime, and Theta prime

[spacenutspod]

Embark on a cosmic odyssey with Andrew Dunkley and Professor Fred Watson as they unravel the mysteries of the universe's expansion and unearth a colossal Martian secret in this episode of Space Nuts. Dive into the perplexing debate over the universe's expansion rate, as new findings from the James Webb Space Telescope reignite the Hubble tension. With precision cosmology at our fingertips, discover why the universe's growth spurs more questions than answers, leaving us to ponder the potential for undiscovered physics that could reshape our cosmic understanding. Then, join the expedition to Mars where a hidden giant lay dormant until now. The discovery of a monstrous volcano, nestled in the labyrinthine Noctis Labyrinthus, has scientists buzzing with excitement. Towering over 9,000 meters with a footprint spanning 450 kilometers, this Martian marvel could hold vital clues to the planet's fiery past and icy secrets beneath its surface. As explorers eye this volcanic behemoth as a future landing site, the prospects of unlocking Mars' ancient mysteries have never been more alluring. From the enigmatic expansion of the cosmos to the volcanic vistas of Mars, this episode is a treasure trove for space enthusiasts and cosmic detectives. Tune in and let your imagination soar to new interstellar heights with Space Nuts. Remember to subscribe and follow us for more celestial tales and astronomical adventures. Until our next galactic gathering, keep your eyes to the skies and your heart in the stars. 🚀 Episode Chapters (00:00) Andrew Dunkley introduces the cosmic conundrums (05:12) The Hubble tension and the universe's expansion speed (11:34) Professor Fred Watson discusses the James Webb Space Telescope's findings (18:20) Unveiling the newly discovered Martian volcano (24:45) The potential of Mars' glacial ice and future explorations (28:57) Wrapping up with a look ahead to Space Nuts Q&A This episode is brought to you by NordPass - the best way to manage all your passwords and lose that angst for not very much money. Like... seriously cheap... check out the special discount deal at www.bitesz.com/nordpass

[euphorictruths]

RS Puppis, Cepheid Variable Star

[skylobster]

The “Aha!” photo

Andromeda Nebula: Var! - April 6th, 1996.

"In the 1920s, using photographic plates made with the Mt. Wilson Observatory's 100 inch telescope, Edwin Hubble determined the distance to the Andromeda Nebula - decisively demonstrating the existence of other galaxies far beyond the Milky Way. His notations are evident on the plate shown above (the image is a negative with stars appearing as black dots against the white background of space). By intercomparing plates, Hubble searched for "novae", stars which underwent a sudden increase in brightness. He found several on this plate and marked them with an "N". Later he discovered that one was actually a type of variable star known as a cepheid - crossing out the "N" he wrote "Var!" (upper right). Thanks to the work of Harvard astronomer Henrietta Leavitt, cepheids, regularly varying, pulsating stars, could be used as "standard candle" distance indicators. Identifying such a star allowed Hubble to show that Andromeda was not a small cluster of stars and gas within our own galaxy, but a large galaxy in its own right at a substantial distance from the Milky Way. Hubble's discovery is responsible for our modern concept of a Universe filled with galaxies."

[apod]

2024 October 2

The Large Magellanic Cloud Galaxy Image Credit & Copyright: Ireneusz Nowak; Text: Natalia Lewandowska (SUNY Oswego)

Explanation: It is the largest satellite galaxy of our home Milky Way Galaxy. If you live in the south, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) is quite noticeable, spanning about 10 degrees across the night sky, which is 20 times larger than the full moon towards the southern constellation of the dolphinfish (Dorado). Being only about 160,000 light years away, many details of the LMC's structure can be seen, such as its central bar and its single spiral arm. The LMC harbors numerous stellar nurseries where new stars are being born, which appear in pink in the featured image. It is home to the Tarantula Nebula, the currently most active star forming region in the entire Local Group, a small collection of nearby galaxies dominated by the massive Andromeda and Milky Way galaxies. Studies of the LMC and the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) by Henrietta Swan Leavitt led to the discovery of the period-luminosity relationship of Cepheid variable stars that are used to measure distances across the nearby universe.

∞ Source: apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap241002.html

[mysticstronomy]

HOW IS OUR UNIVERSE EXPANDING RAPIDLY??

Blog#375

Wednesday, February 14th, 2024.

Welcome back,

A warp in the fabric of space and time that acted like a giant magnifying glass may help solve a celestial mystery about the rate of the universe's expansion, which could shed light on the ultimate fate of the universe, a new study finds.

The universe has continued expanding since it was born about 13.8 billion years ago.

By analyzing the present rate of cosmic expansion, known as the Hubble constant, scientists can estimate the age of the universe and details of its fate, such as whether it will expand forever, collapse upon itself or rip apart completely.

Scientists use two primary strategies to measure the Hubble constant. One involves monitoring nearby objects whose properties researchers understand well, such as stellar explosions known as supernovas and pulsating stars called Cepheid variables, to estimate their distances.

The other focuses on the cosmic microwave background (CMB), the leftover radiation from the Big Bang, examining how it has changed over time to estimate how quickly the cosmos has expanded.

However, this pair of methods has produced two different results for the value of the Hubble constant. Data from the CMB suggests that the universe is expanding at the rate of about 41.9 miles (67.5 kilometers) per second per megaparsec (a distance equivalent to 3.26 million light-years).

In contrast, data from supernovas and Cepheids in the nearby universe suggests a rate of about 46 miles (74 km) per second per megaparsec.

This inconsistency suggests that the standard cosmological model — scientists' current understanding of the universe's structure and history — might be wrong. Resolving this controversy, known as the Hubble constant conflict, could shed light on the evolution and fate of the cosmos.

In the new study, an international research team explored another way to measure the Hubble constant. This approach depends on Einstein's model of gravity, in which mass distorts space-time, a bit like how a bowling ball might stretch a rubber sheet it was resting on. The greater the mass of an object, the more that space-time curves around the item, and so the stronger the object's gravitational pull is.

The way in which gravity behaves means that it can bend light like a lens would, so objects seen through powerful gravitational fields, such as those produced by massive clusters of galaxies, are magnified. Gravitational lensing was discovered a century ago, and today, astronomers often use these lenses to see features otherwise too distant and faint to detect with even the largest telescopes.

Originally published on www.space.com

COMING UP!!

(Saturday, February 17th, 2024)

"HOW MUCH LONGER WILL OUR SUN BURN??"

[goshenightie]

Not a lot of people pay attention to this, but most Nanook's/Destruction's blessings in the Simulated Universe are Astronomy related!!

Let's start from the 1 star blessings (not gonna add images because the MAX is 10 images lmao):

Eternally Collapsing Object

(This blessing could be a reference to) The magnetospheric eternally collapsing object (MECO) is an alternative model for black holes initially proposed by Indian scientist Abhas Mitra in 1998 and later generalized by American researchers Darryl J. Leiter and Stanley L. Robertson. A proposed observable difference between MECOs and black holes is that a MECO can produce its own intrinsic magnetic field. An uncharged black hole cannot produce its own magnetic field, though its accretion disk can.

Instability Strip

The unqualified term instability strip usually refers to a region of the Hertzsprung–Russell diagram largely occupied by several related classes of pulsating variable stars: Delta Scuti variables, SX Phoenicis variables, and rapidly oscillating Ap stars (roAps) near the main sequence; RR Lyrae variables where it intersects the horizontal branch; and the Cepheid variables where it crosses the supergiants.

Orbital Redshift

(This blessing could be a reference to) The main causes of electromagnetic redshift in astronomy and cosmology are the relative motions of radiation sources, which give rise to the relativistic Doppler effect, and gravitational potentials, which gravitationally redshift escaping radiation. All sufficiently distant light sources show cosmological redshift corresponding to recession speeds proportional to their distances from Earth, a fact known as Hubble's law that implies the universe is expanding.

Primordial Black Hole

In cosmology, primordial black holes (PBHs) are hypothetical black holes that formed soon after the Big Bang. In the inflationary era and early radiation-dominated universe, extremely dense pockets of subatomic matter may have been tightly packed to the point of gravitational collapse, creating primordial black holes without the supernova compression typically needed to make black holes today. Because the creation of primordial black holes would pre-date the first stars, they are not limited to the narrow mass range of stellar black holes.

(I'm gonna skip the two star blessings because I don't think there's any Astronomy related ones?)

Universal Heat Death Characteristic

The heat death of the universe (also known as the Big Chill or Big Freeze) is a hypothesis on the ultimate fate of the universe, which suggests the universe will evolve to a state of no thermodynamic free energy, and will therefore be unable to sustain processes that increase entropy. Heat death does not imply any particular absolute temperature; it only requires that temperature differences or other processes may no longer be exploited to perform work. In the language of physics, this is when the universe reaches thermodynamic equilibrium.

Non-Inverse Antimatter Equation

E=mc2

The story of antimatter begins (again) with Einstein and his famous formula: E=mc2. It means that energy and mass are interchangeable - so mass can be transformed to energy (as in stars), or energy into mass. And this has huge consequences.

Resonance Interplay: Protostar

A protostar is a very young star that is still gathering mass from its parent molecular cloud. It is the earliest phase in the process of stellar evolution. For a low-mass star (i.e. that of the Sun or lower), it lasts about 500,000 years.

Resonance Interplay: Zero Age Main sequence

zero-age main sequence: a line denoting the main sequence on the H–R diagram for a system of stars that have completed their contraction from interstellar matter and are now deriving all their energy from nuclear reactions, but whose chemical composition has not yet been altered substantially by nuclear reaction.

Resonance Interplay: Substellar Belt

A substellar object, sometimes called a substar, is an astronomical object, the mass of which is smaller than the smallest mass at which hydrogen fusion can be sustained (approximately 0.08 solar masses). This definition includes brown dwarfs and former stars similar to EF Eridani B, and can also include objects of planetary mass, regardless of their formation mechanism and whether or not they are associated with a primary star.

Resonance Formation: Event Horizon

We can think of the event horizon as the black hole's surface. Inside this boundary, the velocity needed to escape the black hole exceeds the speed of light, which is as fast as anything can go. So whatever passes into the event horizon is doomed to stay inside it – even light.

Resonance Formation: Extreme Helium Flash

A helium flash is a very brief thermal runaway nuclear fusion of large quantities of helium into carbon through the triple-alpha process in the core of low-mass stars (between 0.8 solar masses (M☉) and 2.0 M☉) during their red giant phase. The Sun is predicted to experience a flash 1.2 billion years after it leaves the main sequence. A much rarer runaway helium fusion process can also occur on the surface of accreting white dwarf stars.

Resonance Formation: Cataclysmic Variable

Cataclysmic variables (CVs) are binary star systems that have a white dwarf and a normal star companion. They are typically small – the entire binary system is usually the size of the Earth-Moon system – with an orbital period of 1 to 10 hours.

(Sources are all from Wikipedia and the official Nasa website, but correct me if i got some of it wrong^^)

[jameswebb-discoveries]

Discovery Alert! In a new discovery released on September 12, 2023, James Webb Telescope Validates Hubble's Findings on Universe Expansion Rate. Read full article here

Prepare to be awestruck because NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has just dropped some mind-blowing revelations about the universe's expansion rate, and it's a cosmic rollercoaster of discoveries! 🌠

🔭 Imagine a telescope that can peer back in time and unveil the secrets of our universe's evolution. That's exactly what the Webb Telescope, NASA's latest star player, has been up to!

🌟 The Hubble Constant Mystery: One of the cosmos' biggest head-scratchers has been the Hubble Tension – a cosmic conundrum stemming from a puzzling mismatch between the measured expansion rate (Hubble constant) and its prediction from the Big Bang. 🌌

🌠 Cepheid Variables & Type Ia Supernovae: Webb's got some stellar assistants – Cepheid variables and Type Ia supernovae. These cosmic gems help astronomers measure vast cosmic distances and, by extension, the Hubble constant. 💫

🌈 Infrared Vision Superpowers: What sets Webb apart is its remarkable near-infrared vision. Unlike visible light, infrared light pierces through cosmic dust, offering clearer views of these celestial distance markers. 🌌

🪐 Results So Far: Webb's observations have confirmed the precision of the Hubble Space Telescope's earlier measurements while significantly reducing measurement noise. It's like seeing the universe's secrets with a magnifying glass! 🔍🌠

🔮 The Hubble Tension Deepens: But here's the kicker: the Hubble Tension persists! The universe seems to be expanding faster than we predicted. Could this be a hint of exotic dark energy, dark matter, or something completely unexpected? 🌌✨

🚀 The Cosmic Adventure Continues: With Webb confirming Hubble's measurements, the quest to decipher the universe's mysteries deepens. What's next? More observations, more data, and more cosmic riddles to solve! 🌌🔍

Join us as we journey into the heart of the cosmos, armed with the Webb Telescope's revelations and an insatiable curiosity for the universe's grand secrets. Stay tuned for more cosmic updates! 🌠🛰️

[thinkingimages]

A copy of Edwin Hubble's 4-by-5-inch glass plate of M31, which he took with the 100-inch telescope on Mount Wilson. Like many astronomers of his time, he adorned these plates with colorful notations—circles and arrows that identify candidate Cepheid variables, reference stars, and other notable objects. He numbered each confirmed Cepheid variable in order, often followed by exclamation points, as if he couldn’t contain his excitement. In this digital print of a plate made in early 1924, you can make out the notation “V4!!!” in the lower left corner.

“My god, it’s full of stars!”

[delta-orionis]

ooo i love an astronomy iterator! i also thought the lack of any information about outer space in rainworld was weird too so an ittie to fill that void (haha) is really cool.

anyway, the actual ask: what are some of Stars’ favorite objects they’ve observed?

I've seen a bunch of other people with astronomy-related iterators too, and I think they're all really neat!

To give a bit of a long-winded answer to your question:

Rain World is a game about cycles, and there are a lot of cycles in astronomy. Simple things like planets orbiting around a star, moons orbiting around a planet. There's also the stellar cycle of death and rebirth, with material from a dead star being recycled into the next generation of young stars. etc etc.

When I was conceptualizing Three Stars Above Clouds, I imagined that their ancients would place less of an emphasis on Void Fluid and the Void Sea as a means of ascension. They instead wanted to study other cycles out there in the universe, and they created a machine to help them do so.

TSAC is heavily based on the real-life Vera C. Rubin Observatory, which has a similar mission to survey the sky over long periods of time and look for patterns. TSAC would take a particular interest in objects that appear to be trapped in their own cycles, as well as those that seem to defy their cycles.

I personally don't think Rain World's planet is Earth, and thus any Rain World astronomers might not be able to see the same things we can in the night sky. But putting that aside for the moment... here's some examples of things I think Three Stars Above Clouds would enjoy looking at:

P Cygni (aka The Revenant of the Swan) is a blue hypergiant variable star in Cygnus that was first observed in the 1600's. It's a type of star called a Luminous Blue Variable, which are huge, bright stars with unpredictable, often extreme changes in brightness. TSAC would probably like this star because it's full of surprises.

Delta Cephei in Cepheus, a Cepheid Variable star (and the namesake of Cepheid Variables as a classification). Cepheid variables are extremely useful tools for astronomers because their brightness is closely linked to the rate at which they pulsate. TSAC would probably like this one for the opposite reason than P Cygni, because it's very stable.

The Crab Nebula in Taurus, a cloud of gas and dust left behind by an exploded star. The star's corpse, a pulsar, is at the center, and spins extremely quickly, about 30 times per second. This one might be interesting to TSAC because it represents the cycle of death and rebirth- the gas from this star will probably go on to make new stars in the future, but the star's corpse is also left behind, never truly dead, continuing to influence the space around it.

Something I've thought a lot about is the parallels between iterators and stars; they can support entire ecosystems, as well as destroy them, just like stars. Stars are also inherently tied to a cycle of death and rebirth, with their atoms recycled generation after generation. Some stars escape the cycle- namely the ones that go supernova, tearing themselves apart, sometimes even collapsing into a black hole.

I'll probably elaborate more on this in the future, but I do have the idea of comparing Moon and Pebbles to binary stars. Certain binary star pairs end up with one essentially devouring the other, killing their companion slowly, until they eventually go supernova and destroy themselves, leaving only their dying companion behind.

And Sliver of Straw is a dying star that became a black hole. Black holes are the corpses of stars that literally distort space and time around them long after said star is gone, leaving behind nothing but a singularity.

Three Stars Above Clouds' research primarily focuses on learning about these cosmic cycles: what causes them, and how they can be disrupted. Maybe the Solution isn't in the stars, but at the very least it could point TSAC in the right direction, and might help them and the rest of their kind escape the Cycle eventually.

[kuiperkat]

June's Night Sky Notes: Constant Companions: Circumpolar Constellations, Part III

by Kat Troche of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific

In our final installment of the stars around the North Star, we look ahead to the summer months, where depending on your latitude, the items in these circumpolar constellations are nice and high. Today, we’ll discuss Cepheus, Draco, and Ursa Major. These objects can all be spotted with a medium to large-sized telescope under dark skies.

From left to right: Ursa Major, Draco, and Cepheus. Credit: Stellarium Web.

Herschel’s Garnet Star: Mu Cephei is a deep-red hypergiant known as The Garnet Star, or Erakis. While the star is not part of the constellation pattern, it sits within the constellation boundary of Cepheus, and is more than 1,000 times the size of our Sun. Like its neighbor Delta Cephei, this star is variable, but is not a reliable Cepheid variable. Rather, its brightness can vary anywhere between 3.4 to 5.1 in visible magnitude, over the course of 2-12 years.

This composite of data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and Hubble Space Telescope gives astronomers a new look for NGC 6543, better known as the Cat's Eye nebula. This planetary nebula represents a phase of stellar evolution that our sun may well experience several billion years from now. Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical: NASA/STScI

The Cat’s Eye Nebula: Labeled a planetary nebula, there are no planets to be found at the center of this object. Observations taken with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and Hubble Space Telescopes give astronomers a better understanding of this complex, potential binary star, and how its core ejected enough mass to produce the rings of dust. When searching for this object, look towards the ‘belly’ of Draco with a medium-sized telescope.

Bode's Galaxy and the Cigar Galaxy. Credit: NASA, ESA, CXC, and JPL-Caltech

Bode’s Galaxy and the Cigar Galaxy: Using the arrow on the star map, look diagonal from the star Dubhe in Ursa Major. There you will find Bode’s Galaxy (Messier 81) and the Cigar Galaxy (Messier 82). Sometimes referred to as Bode’s Nebula, these two galaxies can be spotted with a small to medium-sized telescope. Bode’s Galaxy is a classic spiral shape, similar to our own Milky Way galaxy and our neighbor, Andromeda. The Cigar Galaxy, however, is known as a starburst galaxy type, known to have a high star formation rate and incredible shapes. This image composite from 2006 combines the power of three great observatories: the Hubble Space Telescope imaged hydrogen in orange, and visible light in yellow green; Chandra X-Ray Observatory portrayed X-ray in blue; Spitzer Space Telescope captured infrared light in red.

[livingforstars]

The Cepheids of M100 - January 10th, 1996.

"Can this blinking star tell us how fast the Universe is expanding? Many astronomers also believe it may also tell us the age of the Universe! The photographed "Cepheid variable" star in M100 brightens and dims over the course of days as its atmosphere expands and contracts. A longer blinking cycle means an intrinsically brighter star. Cepheid variable stars are therefore used as distance indicators. By noting exactly how long the blinking period is and exactly how bright the star appears to be, one can tell the distance to the star and hence the star's parent galaxy. This distance can then be used to match-up easily measured recessional velocity ("redshift") with distance. Once the "Hubble relation" was determined for M100, it can then apply to all galaxies - and hence can tell us how fast the Universe is expanding."

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

Webb researchers discover lensed supernova, confirm Hubble tension

Measuring the Hubble constant, the rate at which the universe is expanding, is an active area of research among astronomers around the world who analyze data from both ground- and space- based observatories. NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has already contributed to this ongoing discussion. Earlier this year, astronomers used Webb data containing Cepheid variables and Type Ia supernovae, reliable distance markers to measure the universe's expansion rate, to confirm NASA's Hubble Space Telescope's previous measurements.

Now, researchers are using an independent method of measurement to further improve the precision of the Hubble constant—gravitationally lensed supernovae. Brenda Frye from the University of Arizona, along with a team of many researchers from different institutions around the world, is leading this effort after Webb's discovery of three points of light in the direction of a distant and densely populated cluster of galaxies. The Space Telescope Science Institute recently invited Dr. Frye to tell us more about what the team has nicknamed Supernova H0pe and how gravitational lensing effects are providing insights into the Hubble constant.

"It all started with one question by the team: 'What are those three dots that weren't there before? Could that be a supernova?'" she said. "The points of light, not visible in 2015 Hubble imaging of the same cluster, were obvious when the images of PLCK G165.7+67.0 arrived on Earth from Webb's Guaranteed Time Observations of the Prime Extragalactic Areas for Reionization and Lensing Science (PEARLS) 'Clusters' program. The team notes the question was the first to pop to mind for good reason: 'The field of G165 was selected for this program due to its high rate of star formation of more than 300 solar masses per year, an attribute that correlates with higher supernova rates.'

"Initial analyses confirmed that these dots corresponded to an exploding star, one with rare qualities. First, it's a Type Ia supernova, an explosion of a white dwarf star. This type of supernova is generally called a 'standard candle,' meaning that the supernova had a known intrinsic brightness. Second, it is gravitationally lensed.

"Gravitational lensing is important to this experiment. The lens, consisting of a cluster of galaxies that is situated between the supernova and us, bends the supernova's light into multiple images. This is similar to how a trifold vanity mirror presents three different images of a person sitting in front of it. In the Webb image, this was demonstrated right before our eyes in that the middle image was flipped relative to the other two images, a 'lensing' effect predicted by theory.

"To achieve three images, the light traveled along three different paths. Since each path had a different length, and light traveled at the same speed, the supernova was imaged in this Webb observation at three different times during its explosion. In the trifold mirror analogy, a time-delay ensued in which the right-hand mirror depicted a person lifting a comb, the left-hand mirror showed hair being combed, and the middle mirror displayed the person putting down the comb.

"Trifold supernova images are special: The time delays, supernova distance, and gravitational lensing properties yield a value for the Hubble constant or H0 (pronounced H-naught). The supernova was named SN H0pe since it gives astronomers hope to better understand the universe's changing expansion rate.

"In an effort to explore SN H0pe further, the PEARLS-Clusters team wrote a Webb Director's Discretionary Time (DDT) proposal that was evaluated by science experts in a dual-anonymous review and recommended by the Webb Science Policies Group for DDT observations. In parallel, data was acquired at the MMT, a 6.5-meter telescope on Mt. Hopkins, and the Large Binocular Telescope on Mt. Graham, both in Arizona. In analyzing both observations, our team was able to confirm that SN H0pe is anchored to a background galaxy, well behind the cluster, that existed 3.5 billion years after the big bang.

"SN H0pe is one of the most distant Type Ia supernovae observed to date. A different team member made another time delay measurement by analyzing the evolution of its light dispersed into its constituent colors or 'spectrum' from Webb, confirming the Type Ia nature of SN H0pe.

"Seven subgroups contributed lens models describing the 2D matter distribution of the galaxy cluster. Since the Type Ia supernova is a standard candle, each lens model was 'graded' by its ability to predict the time delays and supernova brightnesses relative to the true measured values.

"To prevent biases, the results were blinded from these independent groups and revealed to each other on the announced day and time of a 'live unblinding.' The team reports the value for the Hubble constant as 75.4 kilometers per second per megaparsec, plus 8.1 or minus 5.5. [One parsec is equivalent to 3.26 light-years of distance.] This is only the second measurement of the Hubble constant by this method, and the first time using a standard candle. The PEARLS program lead investigator remarked, 'This is one of the great Webb discoveries, and is leading to a better understanding of this fundamental parameter of our universe.'

"Our team's results are impactful: The Hubble constant value matches other measurements in the local universe, and is somewhat in tension with values obtained when the universe was young. Webb observations in Cycle 3 will improve on the uncertainties, allowing more sensitive constraints on H0."

IMAGE: NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) image of the galaxy cluster PLCK G165.7+67.0, also known as G165, on the left shows the magnifying effect a foreground cluster can have on the distant universe beyond. The foreground cluster is 3.6 billion light-years away from Earth. The zoomed region on the right shows supernova H0pe triply imaged (labeled with white dashed circles) due to gravitational lensing. In this image blue represents light at 0.9, 1.15, and 1.5 microns (F090W + F115W + F150W), green is 2.0 and 2.77 microns (F200W + F277W), and red is 3.56, 4.1, and 4.44 microns (F356W + F410M + F444W). Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, B. Frye (University of Arizona), R. Windhorst (Arizona State University), S. Cohen (Arizona State University), J. D’Silva (University of Western Australia, Perth), A. Koekemoer (Space Telescope Science Institute), J. Summers (Arizona State University).

[the-cepheid-system]

Our system name, for anyone curious, is from Cepheid variable, a type of star that varies in temperature and size.

We wanted to name ourselves after star system that have multiple starts, but they're just called multiple star systems so that wouldn't really work 😂

[teachersource]

Henrietta Swan Leavitt was born on July 4, 1868. An American astronomer and graduate of Radcliffe College, she worked at the Harvard College Observatory as a "computer", tasked with examining photographic plates in order to measure and catalog the brightness of stars. This work led her to discover the relationship between the luminosity and the period of Cepheid variables. Leavitt's discovery provided astronomers with the first "standard candle" with which to measure the distance to faraway galaxies, up to about 20 million light years.