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Reaching for the stars – JWST/NIRSpec spectroscopy of a lensed star candidate at z = 4.76

Furtak, Lukas J; Meena, Ashish K; Zackrisson, Erik; Zitrin, Adi; Brammer, Gabriel B; Coe, Dan; Diego, José M; Eldridge, Jan J; Jiménez-Teja, Yolanda; Kokorev, Vasily; Ricotti, Massimo; Welch, Brian; Windhorst, Rogier A; Abdurro’uf; Andrade-Santos, Felipe; Bhatawdekar, Rachana; Bradley, Larry D; Broadhurst, Tom; Chen, Wenlei; Conselice, Christopher J; Dayal, Pratika; Frye, Brenda L; Fujimoto, Seiji; Y-Y Hsiao, Tiger; Kelly, Patrick L; Mahler, Guillaume; Mandelker, Nir; Norman, Colin; Oguri, Masamune; Pirzkal, Norbert; Postman, Marc; Ravindranath, Swara; Vanzella, Eros; Wilkins, Stephen M

Reaching for the stars – JWST/NIRSpec spectroscopy of a lensed star candidate at z = 4.76 Thumbnail


Authors

Lukas J Furtak

Ashish K Meena

Erik Zackrisson

Adi Zitrin

Gabriel B Brammer

Dan Coe

José M Diego

Jan J Eldridge

Yolanda Jiménez-Teja

Vasily Kokorev

Massimo Ricotti

Brian Welch

Rogier A Windhorst

Abdurro’uf

Felipe Andrade-Santos

Rachana Bhatawdekar

Larry D Bradley

Tom Broadhurst

Wenlei Chen

Christopher J Conselice

Pratika Dayal

Brenda L Frye

Seiji Fujimoto

Tiger Y-Y Hsiao

Patrick L Kelly

Nir Mandelker

Colin Norman

Masamune Oguri

Norbert Pirzkal

Marc Postman

Swara Ravindranath

Eros Vanzella

Stephen M Wilkins



Abstract

We present JWST/NIRSpec observations of a highly magnified star candidate at a photometric redshift of zphot ≃ 4.8, previously detected in JWST/NIRCam imaging of the strong lensing (SL) cluster MACS J0647+7015 (z = 0.591). The spectroscopic observation allows us to precisely measure the redshift of the host arc at zspec = 4.758 ± 0.004, and the star’s spectrum displays clear Lyman- and Balmer-breaks commensurate with this redshift. A fit to the spectrum suggests a B-type super-giant star of surface temperature
 K with either a redder F-type companion (⁠
 K) or significant dust attenuation (AV ≃ 0.82) along the line of sight. We also investigate the possibility that this object is a magnified young globular cluster rather than a single star. We show that the spectrum is in principle consistent with a star cluster, which could also accommodate the lack of flux variability between the two epochs. However, the lack of a counter image and the strong upper limit on the size of the object from lensing symmetry, r ≲ 0.5 pc, could indicate that this scenario is somewhat less likely – albeit not completely ruled out by the current data. The presented spectrum seen at a time when the Universe was only ∼1.2 Gyr old showcases the ability of JWST to study early stars through extreme lensing.

Citation

Furtak, L. J., Meena, A. K., Zackrisson, E., Zitrin, A., Brammer, G. B., Coe, D., …Wilkins, S. M. (2024). Reaching for the stars – JWST/NIRSpec spectroscopy of a lensed star candidate at z = 4.76. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters, 527(1), L7–L13. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnrasl/slad135

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Sep 20, 2023
Online Publication Date Sep 22, 2023
Publication Date 2024-01
Deposit Date Feb 6, 2024
Publicly Available Date Feb 6, 2024
Journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters
Publisher Oxford University Press
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 527
Issue 1
Pages L7–L13
DOI https://doi.org/10.1093/mnrasl/slad135
Public URL https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/2227840

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Licence
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Publisher Licence URL
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Copyright Statement
© 2023 The Author(s).
Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal Astronomical Society. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,
provided the original work is properly cited.





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