MSGID: 1:317/3 63f98eec   
   PID: hpt/lnx 1.9.0-cur 2019-01-08   
   TID: hpt/lnx 1.9.0-cur 2019-01-08   
    New discovery sheds light on very early supermassive black holes    
      
     Date:   
         February 24, 2023   
     Source:   
         Royal Astronomical Society   
     Summary:   
         Astronomers have discovered a rapidly growing black hole in one   
         of the most extreme galaxies known in the very early Universe. The   
         discovery of the galaxy and the black hole at its center provides   
         new clues on the formation of the very first supermassive black   
         holes.   
      
      
         Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIN Email   
   FULL STORY   
   ==========================================================================   
   Astronomers from the University of Texas and the University of Arizona   
   have discovered a rapidly growing black hole in one of the most extreme   
   galaxies known in the very early Universe. The discovery of the galaxy   
   and the black hole at its centre provides new clues on the formation of   
   the very first supermassive black holes. The new work is published in   
   Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.   
      
      
   ==========================================================================   
   Using observations taken with the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA),   
   a radio observatory sited in Chile, the team have determined that the   
   galaxy, named COS-87259, containing this new supermassive black hole is   
   very extreme, forming stars at a rate 1000 times that of our own Milky   
   Way and containing over a billion solar masses worth of interstellar   
   dust. The galaxy shines bright from both this intense burst of star   
   formation and the growing supermassive black hole at its centre.   
      
   The black hole is considered to be a new type of primordial black hole   
   -- one heavily enshrouded by cosmic "dust," causing nearly all of its   
   light to be emitted in the mid-infrared range of the electromagnetic   
   spectrum. The researchers have also found that this growing supermassive   
   black hole (frequently referred to as an active galactic nucleus) is   
   generating a strong jet of material moving at near light speed through   
   the host galaxy.   
      
   Today, black holes with masses millions to billions of times greater than   
   that of our own Sun sit at the centre of nearly every galaxy. How these   
   supermassive black holes first formed remains a mystery for scientists,   
   particularly because several of these objects have been found when the   
   Universe was very young.   
      
   Because the light from these sources takes so long to reach us, we see   
   them as they existed in the past; in this case, just 750 million years   
   after the Big Bang, which is approximately 5% of the current age of   
   the Universe.   
      
   What is particularly astonishing about this new object is that it was   
   identified over a relatively small patch of the sky typically used to   
   detect similar objects -- less than 10 times the size of the full moon --   
   suggesting there could be thousands of similar sources in the very early   
   Universe. This was completely unexpected from previous data.   
      
   The only other class of supermassive black holes we knew about in the   
   very early Universe are quasars, which are active black holes that are   
   relatively unobscured by cosmic dust. These quasars are extremely rare   
   at distances similar to COS-87259, with only a few tens located over the   
   full sky. The surprising discovery of COS-87259 and its black hole raises   
   several questions about the abundance of very early supermassive black   
   holes, as well as the types of galaxies in which they typically form.   
      
   Ryan Endsley, the lead author of the paper and now a Postdoctoral Fellow   
   at The University of Texas at Austin, says "These results suggest that   
   very early supermassive black holes were often heavily obscured by dust,   
   perhaps as a consequence of the intense star formation activity in their   
   host galaxies. This is something others have been predicting for a few   
   years now, and it's really nice to see the first direct observational   
   evidence supporting this scenario."  Similar types of objects have been   
   found in the more local, present-day Universe, such as Arp 299 shown   
   here. In this system, two galaxies are crashing together generating an   
   intense starburst as well as heavy obscuration of the growing supermassive   
   black hole in one of the two galaxies.   
      
   Endsley adds, "While nobody expected to find this kind of object in the   
   very early Universe, its discovery takes a step towards building a much   
   better understanding of how billion solar mass black holes were able to   
   form so early on in the lifetime of the Universe, as well how the most   
   massive galaxies first evolved."   
       * RELATED_TOPICS   
             o Space_&_Time   
                   # Black_Holes # Galaxies # Astrophysics # Astronomy #   
                   Stars # Cosmology # Big_Bang # Solar_System   
       * RELATED_TERMS   
             o Spitzer_space_telescope o Black_hole o Galaxy o   
             Holographic_Universe o Galaxy_formation_and_evolution o Quasar   
             o Edwin_Hubble o Black_body   
      
   ==========================================================================   
   Story Source: Materials provided by Royal_Astronomical_Society. Note:   
   Content may be edited for style and length.   
      
      
   ==========================================================================   
   Journal Reference:   
      1. Ryan Endsley, Daniel P Stark, Jianwei Lyu, Feige Wang, Jinyi Yang,   
         Xiaohui Fan, Renske Smit, Rychard Bouwens, Kevin Hainline, Sander   
         Schouws. ALMA confirmation of an obscured hyperluminous radio-loud   
         AGN at z = 6.853 associated with a dusty starburst in the 1.5 deg2   
         COSMOS field.   
      
         Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 2023; 520 (3):   
         4609 DOI: 10.1093/mnras/stad266   
   ==========================================================================   
      
   Link to news story:   
   https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/02/230224135116.htm   
      
   --- up 51 weeks, 4 days, 10 hours, 50 minutes   
    * Origin: -=> Castle Rock BBS <=- Now Husky HPT Powered! (1:317/3)   
   SEEN-BY: 15/0 106/201 114/705 123/120 153/7715 226/30 227/114 229/111   
   SEEN-BY: 229/112 113 307 317 400 426 428 470 664 700 292/854 298/25   
   SEEN-BY: 305/3 317/3 320/219 396/45   
   PATH: 317/3 229/426