‘Direct Collapse’ Black Hole tagged posts

Image from the DCBH simulation shows density (left) and temperature (right) of an early galaxy. Supernovae shock waves can be seen expanding from the center, disrupting and heating the galaxy.
Credit: Georgia Tech

A simulation has suggested what astronomers should look for if they search the skies for a direct collapse black hole in its early stages. Black holes form when stars die, allowing the matter in them to collapse into an extremely dense object from which not even light can escape. Astronomers theorize that massive black holes could also form at the birth of a galaxy, but so far nobody has been able to look far enough back in time to observe the conditions creating these direct collapse black holes (DCBH).

The James Webb Space Telescope, scheduled for launch in 2021, might be able l...

An image based on a supercomputer simulation of the cosmological environment where primordial gas undergoes the direct collapse to a black hole. The gas flows along filaments of dark matter that form a cosmic web connecting structures in the early universe. The first galaxies formed at the intersection of these dark matter filaments. Credit: Aaron Smith/TACC/UT-Austin

An unusual black hole born extremely early in the universe has been found. They showed a recently discovered unusual source of intense radiation is likely powered by a “direct-collapse black hole,” a type of object predicted by theorists more than a decade ago. “It’s a cosmic miracle,” Bromm said, referring to the precise set of conditions present half a billion years after the Big Bang that allowed them to emerge...