Sauron’s Eye has been found. And it’s watching us all, from above, in the form of ringed star HR 4796A

IT’S the disembodied icon of evil in film and literature — and it has been found in space by scientists hunting for Earth-like planets.

This infrared image shows the dust ring around the nearby star HR 4796A in the southern constellation of Centaurus. It was one of the first produced by the SPHERE instrument soon after it was installed on ESO’s Very Large Telescope in May 2014. It shows not only the ring itself with great clarity, but also reveals the power of SPHERE to reduce the glare from the very bright star — the key to finding and studying exoplanets in future.

THE universe has a sense of humour. Or at least literary (well, movie spinoff) appreciation.

Why else would J.R.R. Tolkien’s iconic “Eye of Sauron” be found amid all the interstellar wonders?

The lidless eye — the disembodied icon of evil — was captured perfectly by Peter Jackson in his film adaptations of Lord of the Rings.

Thanks to the original books, it had struck fear into the hearts of generations for many years before and has inspired many fantasy artists.

But have all the artisitc renderings been topped by nature — by a stellar lord of the ringeds?

This amazing image shows the ringed star HR 4796A in the constellation Centaurus.

It is one of the first images returned by the new SPHERE exoplanet-hunting telescope based in Chile.

The “Spectro-Polarimetric High-contrast Exoplanet Research “ instrument takes the fuzzy photos captured by advanced optical telescopes and filters out the fuzz — leaving exceptionally sharp images.

Lord of the ringeds ... the ringed star HR 4796A. Image: ESO/J.-L. Beuzit et al./SPHERE Consortium.

The seemingly magic clarity is achieved by compensating for the movements of the Earth’s atmosphere, and sensors which can differentiate between the glow of a distant star and the reflections of this light from its own planets and orbital bodies.

This is all for the purpose of finding planets — in particular Earth-like planets. Hopefully, the light captured from these worlds may even reveal the presence of the chemical evidence of life.

Let’s hope this newly-pictured star’s penetrating “gaze” is less malevolent than that of the fictional Sauron’s Eye. The same applies to any inhabitants that may be spinning around in the planetary Mordors that surround it.

And if HR 4796A is to emerge as an interplanetary evil eye, it definitely needs a more menacing name. Call in Team Tolkein...