Pure Korean Words 'Maru' and 'Ara' Named for an Alien Star 63 Light-Years Away

Two Target Stars of James Webb Space Telescope Observations
IAU Selects Korean Submissions 'Maru' and 'Aru'

The eyes of humanity revealing the secrets of the birth of the universe, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), has two stars it will observe named with pure Korean words.

The Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute announced on the 8th that the International Astronomical Union (IAU) selected Maru and Ahra, proposed by South Korea, as the names for the star WD 0806-661 and the exoplanet WD 0806-661 b, which are JWST's observation targets. Going forward, Maru and Ahra will be used permanently as proper nouns alongside their scientific designations.

To commemorate the 10th anniversary of the IAU Office for Astronomy Outreach (IAU OAO), the IAU held a naming contest for exoplanets in October 2022. This global contest received a total of 603 name proposals from 91 countries. The IAU final selection committee reviewed the candidates proposed by each country and announced the final 20 exoplanetary system names.

In Korea, from October for about a month, 32 name proposals were submitted through preliminary screening. After written and presentation evaluations conducted by teams of astronomers and the general public, one final representative team and two backup teams were selected.

The WD exoplanetary system is located about 63 light-years from Earth in the constellation Pictor in the southern sky. It consists of the star WD 0806-661, which has about 0.6 times the mass of the Sun, and the exoplanet WD 0806-661 b, which is about eight times heavier than Jupiter. The distance between the star and the planet is approximately 2500 AU (1 AU = the average distance between the Sun and Earth, about 150 million km).

Previously, in 2019, Baekdu and Halla, submitted by Korea, were also selected as names for exoplanetary systems.