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Webb Researchers Discover Lensed Supernova, Confirm Hubble Tension

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, and a team of many researchers from different institutions around the world, are leading this effort after Webb’s discovery of three points of light in the direction of a distant and densely populated cluster of galaxies.

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An illustration of Sun-like star HD 181327 and its surrounding debris disk. The star is at top right. It is surrounded by a far larger debris disk that forms an incomplete ellpitical path and is cut off at right. There’s a huge cavity between the star and the disk. The debris disk is shown in shades of light gray. Toward the top and left, there are finer, more discrete points in a range of sizes. The disk appears hazier and smokier at the bottom. The star is bright white at center, with a hazy blue region around it. The background of space is black. The label Artist's Concept appears at lower left.