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We are

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so excited because the Hubble Space
Telescope has actually observed

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the farthest star, individual star
that we've ever seen.

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It's shining to us from nearly 13 billion
light years away.

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That means its light began its trek to us
nearly 13 billion years ago,

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and we're able to discern its light
even now.

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Hubble was able to pick out this one

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individual star
within its galaxy In an unusual way,

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it's a technique or a trick in a sense
that we call gravitational lensing.

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Nature itself
provides us this magnification

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When we have something very massive,
in this case a cluster of galaxies

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that distorts space itself
through the gravity caused by the mass

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inside the cluster, that distorted space
actually acts like a lens.

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So anything behind it, that shining light
that comes through it on

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its way to us gets distorted.

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The light gets stretched out into
interesting arcs and things get magnified.

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We use Hubble to see magnified
distant galaxies quite often.

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This gravitational lensing effect
helps us to study

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very distant galaxies that get magnified.

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But we usually cannot identify individual
stars in those distant galaxies.

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Usually the light from the hundreds
of billions of stars gets blended together

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In this case,
the alignment of that foreground cluster

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or the lens, as we call it with
the background galaxy was just right.

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So that one star in the outskirts
of that background galaxy

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was just in the line of sight
to get magnified

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hundreds of times
over its normal brightness,

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and we were able to pick it out
and discern it as an individual star

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By observing and discerning

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one individual star
in an extremely distant galaxy,

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we can start to learn

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what stars were like when they first began
to form in the universe.

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So keep in mind
that this star is in a galaxy

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that's nearly 13 billion light years away.

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That means it took nearly 13 billion years
for this light to get to us.

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Our whole universe is only 13.8 billion
years old.

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So this galaxy had formed
early in the universe.

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Its stars are primitive.

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There
hadn't been very many generations of stars

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yet coming and going in that galaxy
to create the heavier

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elements
that enrich stars like our sun today.

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So we expect by studying
this individual star in this very distant

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early galaxy, that we'll learn
what the early universe was like

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and what some of the earliest
generations of stars were made of

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The Hubble
Space Telescope is doing very well.

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It's powerful.

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It's as scientifically productive as ever,
and we're looking forward

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to the kinds of science that Hubble
will be doing in the coming years.

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We're particularly excited about the James
Webb Space Telescope,

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also operating in space,
along with the Hubble Space Telescope.

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By having both
of these amazing facilities.

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We're going to learn more
about the universe than we've ever been

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able to before.

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The Webb telescope can follow up
on observations such as this one of this

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distant star with Hubble by doing
follow up spectroscopy,

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sensitive infrared observations,
giving us more information.

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And then in general, the Hubble telescope

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sees kinds of light
that the Webb cannot see and vice versa.

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So we'll have the Webb telescope

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teaching us things that the universe
reveals to us in infrared light.

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And the Hubble telescope observing
invisible light and ultraviolet light.

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And together, the information
from these two observatories

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is going to give us a brand new view
in a richer understanding

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of everything from these distant galaxies
to even stars

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and their planets in our own galaxy
and even our own solar system.

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This star

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shining
to us from very early in the universe

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seems to be somewhat different
than our sun.

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It's bigger, maybe 50 or 100 times
as massive as our sun.

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And we expect that this star's

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composition
is going to be different than our sun's,

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because this star was shining very close
to the beginning of the universe,

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long before we had generations of stars
coming and going

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and creating heavier elements
that enrich our own sun.

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This star is probably
almost entirely hydrogen,

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a little helium,
a smattering of other materials.

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We'll know more when we do
further observations of the star

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with the James Webb Space Telescope.

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This is the farthest individual star
we've ever seen.

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It's not the oldest star.

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In fact, what we're seeing in this
galaxy is a very young star

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that was at its time just getting started.

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Now, this was nearly 13 billion years ago,

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because it's taken that long for the light
to get to us.

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So we're not seeing that galaxy as it is
today.

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We're seeing it as it was toward
the beginning of the universe.

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And this star in its galaxy
was a very young star at that time.

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I find it intriguing that we can see one

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individual star among hundreds of billions
in a distant galaxy.

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We're used to seeing now because

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of the wonders of the Hubble Space
Telescope, distant galaxies.

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And I love the rich variety of galaxies
that the Hubble Space Telescope picks up.

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But these most distant galaxies have light
that's pretty much blended together.

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They're so far away, we can't usually
discern the individual stars.

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What's exciting to me about this
is that we can actually see

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the stretched out, distorted image
of the galaxy stretched out

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by the lensing effect of the foreground
gravitational lensing cluster.

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But we can also pick out this
individual star,

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learn about where it's perched
within this galaxy.

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And hopefully, as we study
it more, learn about how it was formed,

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what it's made of, and start understanding
how the earliest stars in the universe

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contributed to their galaxies
and to subsequent generations of stars

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like our own sun.

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The Hubble Space Telescope is doing
very well.

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We're excited about that.

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It's technically sound.

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We've got a terrific crew of experts
on the ground that monitor Hubble's

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health every day.

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And we are continuing
a vibrant scientific program

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of observing everything
from these distant galaxies and stars

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to stars
and their planets in our own galaxy.

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We have plans for doing Hubble science
throughout this decade.

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And we're particularly excited
as to how Hubble will complement

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the new James Webb Space Telescope.

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They have different capabilities
that will complement each other as we're

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studying everything from our solar system
to the distant universe.

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I'm very excited

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about this combination of Webb and Hubble
for looking at things

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like how galaxies have changed over
the billion year history of the universe.

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The Hubble telescope can show us
how vigorous star formation

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is going on in regions and galaxies
close to us, and even at intermediate

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distances between us
and the very early universe.

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The Webb can peer farther
back into space and time

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and show us what the first proto galaxies,
infant galaxies were like as

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they were beginning to form
with Hubble and Webb together, we can see

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this whole kind of generational picture
of early galaxies and later galaxies.

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And they tell us something about
how the universe has changed over time

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and how galaxies have even
become more habitable

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to planets
and even life on at least one planet.