Archival Hubble Data May Show Missing Cosmic Link

Artist concept of GNz7q, a supermassive black hole inside a dust-shrouded core of a vigorously star-forming “starburst” galaxy. Credit: NASA, ESA, N. Bartmann

A research paper published in Nature on April 13th, 2022 found a possible missing cosmic link after reviewing archival data from the Hubble Space Telescope. This finding could provide evidence of the stages between young star-forming galaxies and the first supermassive black holes.

The object in question, GNz7q, is believed to be a rapidly growing, newly formed black hole. It was found in the Hubble Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey-North field (GOODS-North), taken by Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS). GNz7q is a compact source of UV and infrared light consistent with the radiation expected from materials falling into a black hole.

“Our analysis suggests that GNz7q is the first example of a rapidly growing black hole in the dusty core of a starburst galaxy at an epoch close to the earliest supermassive black hole known in the universe. The object’s properties across the electromagnetic spectrum are in excellent agreement with predictions from theoretical simulations.” — Seiji Fujimoto, an astronomer at the Niels Bohr Institute of the University of Copenhagen and lead author of the study.

The Hubble GOODS North Field. The red dot in the center of the right image is where GNz7q is located. Credit: NASA, ESA, Garth Illingworth (UC Santa Cruz), Pascal Oesch (UC Santa Cruz, Yale), Rychard Bouwens (LEI), I. Labbe (LEI), Cosmic Dawn Center/Niels Bohr Institute/University of Copenhagen, Denmark