English

Evidence for a direct collapse black hole in the Lyman-alpha source CR7

Astrophysics of Galaxies 2016-07-27 v2

Abstract

Throughout the epoch of reionization the most luminous Ly{\alpha} emitters are capable of ionizing their own local bubbles. The CR7 galaxy at z6.6z \approx 6.6 stands out for its combination of exceptionally bright Ly{\alpha} and HeII 1640 Angstrom line emission but absence of metal lines. As a result CR7 may be the first viable candidate host of a young primordial starburst or direct collapse black hole. High-resolution spectroscopy reveals a +160 km s1^{-1} velocity offset between the Ly{\alpha} and HeII line peaks while the spatial extent of the Ly{\alpha} emitting region is 16\sim 16 kpc. The observables are indicative of an outflow signature produced by a strong central source. We present one-dimensional radiation-hydrodynamics simulations incorporating accurate Ly{\alpha} feedback and ionizing radiation to investigate the nature of the CR7 source. We find that a Population III star cluster with 10510^5 K blackbody emission ionizes its environment too efficiently to generate a significant velocity offset. However, a massive black hole with a nonthermal Compton-thick spectrum is able to reproduce the Ly{\alpha} signatures as a result of higher photon trapping and longer potential lifetime. For both sources, Ly{\alpha} radiation pressure turns out to be dynamically important.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1602.07639,
  title  = {Evidence for a direct collapse black hole in the Lyman-alpha source CR7},
  author = {Aaron Smith and Volker Bromm and Abraham Loeb},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1602.07639},
  year   = {2016}
}

Comments

9 pages, 7 figures, MNRAS, in press