In a milestone breakthrough, astronomers have discovered the oldest supermassive black hole ever seen. The extraordinary find dates back to the early days of the universe and ignites the farthest quasar that was still known.
The huge black hole weighs with a mass equal to the combined mass of 1.6 billion suns. It dates back 670 million years to the Big Bang, when the universe was only five percent of its current age.
The black hole lies at the heart of the earliest quasar ever discovered. Quasars are the incredibly bright core of an active galaxy. Their powerful glow is created by the extraordinary amounts of energy released by gas that falls to the supermassive black hole in their middle.
The quasar is 13.03 billion light-years from Earth, making it the furthest quasar ever discovered. Remote quasars are crucial to understanding the nature of the early universe. They provide insights into the formation of black holes and massive galaxies in that period.
The object is the first of its kind to provide evidence of an outflowing wind of superheated gas escaping from the vicinity of the black hole at a fifth of the speed of light.
The astronomers also observed intense star-forming activity in the galaxy where the quasar is located.
The extraordinary size of the black hole and the fact that it dates so early in the universe contradicts the current scientific understanding of how these cosmic giants originated.
Supermassive black holes are suspected to grow from smaller seed black holes that devour matter. Researchers from the University of Arizona have calculated that even if the seed of the black hole formed directly after the first stars in the universe and grew as fast as possible, it would need an initial mass of at least 10,000 suns.
It’s simply too fast for current models of how seed forms black holes, due to the collapse of massive stars.
“This is the earliest evidence of how a supermassive black hole affects its surrounding host system,” said the paper’s lead author, Feige Wang.
“From observations of galaxies from a distance, we know it has to happen, but we’ve never seen it happen so early in the universe.”
The researchers hope to find out more about the quasar and black hole with future observations, especially with NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, which will be launched later this year.
Also on rt.com
Spectacular ‘rose’ of star-forming regions surrounds a distant super-massive black hole
Do you think your friends will be interested? Share this story!