Related papers: SMBH Seeds from Dissipative Dark Matter
Quasars observed at redshifts $z\sim 6-7.5$ are powered by supermassive black holes which are too large to have grown from early stellar remnants without efficient super-Eddington accretion. A proposal for alleviating this tension is for…
We present the results of the first fully cosmological hydrodynamical simulations studying the merger-driven model for massive black hole (BH) seed formation via direct collapse. Using the zoom-in technique as well as particle splitting, we…
There is controversy surrounding the origin and evolution of our universe's largest supermassive black holes (SMBHs). In this study, we consider the possibility that some of these black holes formed from the direct collapse of primordial…
Recent observations of the high-redshift universe have uncovered a significant number of active galactic nuclei, implying that supermassive black holes (SMBHs) would have to have been formed at much earlier times than expected. Direct…
In this white paper we explore the capabilities required to identify and study supermassive black holes formed from heavy seeds ($\mathrm{M_{\bullet}} \sim 10^4 - 10^6 \, \mathrm{M_{\odot}}$) in the early Universe. To obtain an unequivocal…
The nature of the origins of supermassive black holes remains uncertain. Multiple possible seeding pathways have been proposed across a variety of mass scales, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. One such channel is a direct…
We have performed cosmological hydrodynamic simulations to study the effect of fragmentation on the SMBH seed mass in the direct collapse formation scenario. We considered different background UV intensities, host halo spin, and halo merger…
A group of massive galaxies at redshifts of $z\gtrsim 7$ have been recently detected by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), which were unexpected to form so early within the framework of standard Big Bang cosmology. In this work, we…
Intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs), with masses in the range $100-10^{6}$ M$_{\odot}$, are the link between stellar-mass BHs and supermassive BHs (SMBHs). They are thought to be the seeds from which SMBHs grow, which would explain the…
Observations of high-redshift quasars at z>6 imply that supermassive black holes (SMBHs) with masses over a billion solar masses were in place less than 1 Gyr after the Big Bang. If these SMBHs assembled from "seed" BHs left behind by the…
We study black hole (BH) formation from the nonlinear growth and collapse of primordial perturbations during the matter-dominated era. Modelling cold dark matter (CDM) as pressureless dust, we describe the collapse in a fully nonlinear…
We characterize the overdensity (spike) of fermionic dark matter (DM) particles around a supermassive black hole (SMBH) within a general relativistic analysis. The initial DM halo distribution is obtained by solving the equilibrium…
The formation of ultra rare supermassive black holes (SMBHs), with masses of $\mathcal O(10^9\,M_\odot)$, in the first billion years of the Universe remains an open question in astrophysics. At the same time, ultralight dark matter (DM)…
It has been proposed that the first, intermediate-mass ($\approx 10^{5-6}~M_\odot$) black holes might form through direct collapse of unpolluted gas in atomic-cooling halos exposed to a strong Lyman-Werner (LW) or near-infrared (NIR)…
Deciphering the formation of supermassive black holes~(SMBHs) is a key science goal for upcoming observational facilities. In most theoretical channels proposed so far, the seed formation depends crucially on local gas conditions. We…
We investigated a sample of 15 luminous high-redshift quasars (3.3 < z < 5.1) to measure the mass of their super-massive black holes (SMBH) and compare, for the first time, results based on CIV, MgII, and Hbeta emission lines at…
The observational evidence for a population of quasars powered by supermassive black holes of mass \geq 10^9 M_sun at redshifts z\geq 6 poses a great challenge for any model describing the formation of galaxies. Assuming uninterrupted…
Supermassive black holes (SMBHs) are ubiquitous in galaxies with a sizable mass. It is expected that a pair of SMBHs originally in the nuclei of two merging galaxies would form a binary and eventually coalesce via a burst of gravitational…
We investigate a hierarchical structure formation scenario describing the evolution of a Super Massive Black Holes (SMBHs) population. The seeds of the local SMBHs are assumed to be 'pregalactic' black holes, remnants of the first POPIII…
Dark matter annihilation might power the first luminous stars in the Universe. These types of stars, known as dark stars, could form in $(10^6\mathrm{-}10^8)\,M_\odot$ protohalos at redshifts $z \sim 20$, and they could be much more…