Right now you may be asking yourself what the f*&% a gravitational lens/Einstein's ring is. This is natural, as you may not have taken any of the fine astronomy courses the University of Texas has to offer. Austinist has suffered in your stead. As defined by knowlex.org:

"A gravitational lens is formed when the light from a very distant, bright source (such as a quasar) is 'bent' around a massive object (such as a massive galaxy) between the source object and the observer. The process is known as gravitational lensing, and was one of the predictions made by Einstein's general relativity."

Essentially, the gravity of the massive object curves the light around itself enough for it to act as a magnifying lens for another object further on down the cosmic foyer.

Remi Cabanac (the discoverer) and Chris Lidman (the co-author) of the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope, in Hawaii, published their paper titled Discovery of a high red-shift Einstein Ring just a few days ago on April 27th. The lens is in the shape of a C with a circumference of 270 degrees and a radius of 1 3/4 arc seconds. This equates to the "size of a star's 'virtual' image seen at high power through a small amateur telescope." (Universe Today) The most complete lens found before this one was just under a half-circle in circumference, at 170 degrees.

The "lens galaxy" is an extremely massive, yet isolated, elliptical galaxy about 7 billion light years away on the outskirts of a galaxy cluster in the area of the Fornax constellation. The "source galaxy" (the magnified galaxy) lies approximately 11 billion light years away, when the universe was only 12% of the age it is now. The new official designation for both the source and lens galaxy is FOR J0332-3557.

Most importantly, this discovery makes the source galaxy the most luminous object found at these vast distances, allowing for both a greater understanding of the early universe and the evolution of elliptical galaxies through the corridors of time. Not to mention it's f-ing cool.