--- title: Astronomers Discover Earliest Stars in Galaxy Named After Ronaldo description: The stars are allegedly hundreds or thousands of times larger than the sun. canonical: https://time.com/3924415/astronomers-monster-stars/ author: Katy Osborn article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-06-17T17:48:51.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T08:17:16.737Z article:section: Science og:title: Galaxy of Life-Giving Super-Stars Named After Cristiano Ronaldo og:description: Their light has been traveling from a far-off galaxy for 12.9 billion years. og:url: https://time.com/3924415/astronomers-monster-stars/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf1660a43c6c80a5c/698854efe53aba845f4de370/cr7-eso.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: CR7 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Galaxy of Life-Giving Super-Stars Named After Cristiano Ronaldo twitter:description: Their light has been traveling from a far-off galaxy for 12.9 billion years. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf1660a43c6c80a5c/698854efe53aba845f4de370/cr7-eso.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Astronomers Name Galaxy of Super-Stars After Cristiano Ronaldo by [Katy Osborn](https://time.com/author/katy-osborn/) ## Katy Osborn Jun 17, 2015 5:48 PM UTC  This artist’s impression shows CR7 a very distant galaxy discovered using ESO’s Very Large Telescope. This artist’s impression shows CR7 a very distant galaxy discovered using ESO’s Very Large Telescope.M. Kornmesser—ESO by [Katy Osborn](https://time.com/author/katy-osborn/) ## Katy Osborn Jun 17, 2015 5:48 PM UTC Astronomers say a newly-discovered batch of gigantic, super-intense stars that burned out millennia ago may have helped create life in our universe, and they’ve named the galaxy where they found them after one of the world’s most luminous soccer players. The group of astronomers at the University of Lisbon in Portugal and the Leiden Observatory in the Netherlands announced that they’d spotted evidence for these stars in a previously unknown galaxy of extremely luminous helium and hydrogen, [the New York _Times_ reports](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/18/science/space/astronomers-report-finding-earliest-stars-that-enriched-cosmos.html?%5Fr=0). They named the galaxy CR7 in honor of the Portuguese soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo. The authors write in _The Astrophysics Journal_ that the stars’ explosions within our universe could have spawned elements that began the chain of thermonuclear reactions through which modern-day stars give off carbon, oxygen, and iron — the elements that helped create planets, and life. Dr. David Sobral, who leads the team at The University of Lisbon, told the New York _Times_ in a statement from the European Southern Observatory, “It doesn’t really get any more exciting than this.” [\[_NYT_\]](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/18/science/space/astronomers-report-finding-earliest-stars-that-enriched-cosmos.html?%5Fr=0) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3924415/astronomers-monster-stars/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3924415/astronomers-monster-stars/"},"headline":"Astronomers Name Galaxy of Super-Stars After Cristiano Ronaldo","datePublished":"2015-06-17T17:48:51.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T08:17:16.737Z","description":"Their light has been traveling from a far-off galaxy, CR7, for 12.9 billion years.","url":"https://time.com/3924415/astronomers-monster-stars/","keywords":["astronomy"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf1660a43c6c80a5c/698854efe53aba845f4de370/cr7-eso.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Katy Osborn","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/katy-osborn/"}],"articleSection":"Science","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf1660a43c6c80a5c/698854efe53aba845f4de370/cr7-eso.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"CR7","caption":"CR7","creditText":"M. 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