Ohio State University | 25 Aug 2010
Direct formation of supermassive black holes via multi-scale gas inflows in galaxy mergers L Mayer et alAstronomers believe they have discovered the origin of our universe’s first super-massive black holes, which formed some 13 billion years ago.
The discovery fills in a missing chapter of our universe’s early history, and could help write the next chapter -- in which scientists better understand how gravity and dark matter formed the universe as we know it.
In the journal Nature, Ohio State University astronomer Stelios Kazantzidis and colleagues describe computer simulations in which they modeled the evolution of galaxies and black holes during the first few billion years after the Big Bang.
Our universe is thought to be 14 billion years old. Other astronomers recently determined that big galaxies formed much earlier in the universe’s history than previously thought -- within the first 1 billion years, Kazantzidis explained.
These new computer simulations show that the first-ever super-massive black holes were likely born when those early galaxies collided and merged together.
Video simulations available here and here.
- Nature 466 (26 Aug 2010) DOI: 10.1038/nature09294
- Nature 466 (26 Aug 2010) DOI: 10.1038/4661049a
- Nature 466 (26 Aug 2010) Editor's Summary