GRAVITY discovers new double star in Orion Trapezium Cluster

As part of the first observations with the new GRAVITY instrument the team looked closely at the bright, young stars known as the Trapezium Cluster, located in the heart of the Orion star-forming region. Already, from these first data, GRAVITY made a discovery: one of the components of the cluster (Theta¹ Orionis F) was found to be a double star for the first time.

This zoom video starts with a broad view of the famous constellation of Orion (The Hunter) and then shows successively more detailed images of the region with different telescopes. The final view from GRAVITY reveals far finer detail around one of the fainter cluster stars than could be detected even with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.