Hubble Indicates Possible Reason For Birth Of Supermassive Black Holes After Big Bang

Astronomers have never been able to comprehend how early supermassive black holes could form so fast following the Big Bang. But now scientists have used information from Hubble as well as two more space telescopes that show the conclusive evidence on the birth of these phenomena.

Experts used computer models as well as a data analysis method from the NASA Chandra X-ray Observatory, the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope and the NASA Spitzer Space Telescope, to locate a couple of objects believed to be the most likely for "black hole seeds."

Each object has an initial mass about 100,000 times that of the sun and was seen less than a billion years after the Big Bang.

"Our discovery, if confirmed, would explain how these monster black holes were born," said Fabio Pacucci of Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, Italy and lead author.

The two main speculations on supermassive black hole formation have the first suggesting that seeds grow out of black holes, about 10 to 100 times greater than the sun. They continue to grow through mergers with smaller black holes. Still, if the supermassive black holes that have been found in the young universe fit this theory, their growth would have been at unusually high rates.

The new findings support the second theory, which explains that huge black hole seeds with masses that are 100,000 times that of our sun are formed through the collapse of massive gas clouds. It shows how the early supermassive black holes were formed.

"There are a lot of controversies over which path these black holes take," said Andrea Ferrara of Scuola Normale Superiore and co-author of the study. "Our work suggests we are converging on one answer, where black holes start big and grow at the normal rate, rather than starting small and growing at a very fast rate."

"Black hole seeds are extremely hard to find and confirming their detection is very difficult," added Andrea Grazian from the National Institute for Astrophysics in Italy and co-author of the study. "However, we think our research has uncovered the two best candidates so far."

The findings were published online on March 28,2016, in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.