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JWST has revealed a ubiquitous population of ``little red dots'' (LRDs) at $z\gtrsim4$, selected via their red rest-frame optical emission and compact morphologies. They are thought to be reddened by dust, whether in tori of active galactic…

The discovery of Little Red Dots (LRDs) -- a population of compact, high-redshift, dust-reddened galaxies -- is one of the most surprising results from JWST. However, the nature of LRDs is still debated: does the near-infrared emission…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2024-06-14 Tonima Tasnim Ananna , Ákos Bogdán , Orsolya E. Kovács , Priyamvada Natarajan , Ryan C. Hickox

Several local ($z\lesssim 0.2$) metal-poor dwarf AGNs have remarkably similar properties to those of high-redshift Little Red Dots (LRDs), and are recently proposed to be local analogs of LRDs. We use long-term photometric and spectroscopic…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-11-21 Colin J. Burke , Zachary Stone , Yue Shen , Yan-Fei Jiang

JWST's "Little Red Dots" (LRDs) are increasingly interpreted as active galactic nuclei (AGN) obscured by dense thermalized gas rather than dust as evidenced by their X-ray weakness, blackbody-like continua, and Balmer line profiles. A key…

The high-redshift ($z>4$) compact sources with ``V-shaped" spectral energy distributions (SEDs), known as Little Red Dots (LRDs), are discovered by the James Webb Space Telescope and provide valuable clues to the physics of active galactic…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-08-26 Shuying Zhou , Mouyuan Sun , Zijian Zhang , Jie Chen , Luis C. Ho

The JWST discovery of ``little red dots'' (LRDs) is reshaping our picture of the early Universe, yet the physical mechanisms driving their compact size and UV-optical colors remain elusive. Here we report an unusually bright LRD ($z=3.1$)…

James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has revealed a new class of high-redshift, very red, compact broad-line sources, termed as "little red dots" (LRDs). The physical mechanism driving these properties remains elusive. We construct spectral…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2026-01-15 Chenxuan Zhang , Qingwen Wu , Xiao Fan , Luis C. Ho , Jiancheng Wu , Huanian Zhang , Bing Lyu , Xinwu Cao , Jianmin Wang

We present the properties of two candidate massive ($M_\star\sim10^{11}M_\odot$) and dusty ($A_{\rm v}>2.5$ mag) galaxies at $z=5-7$ in the first 0.28 deg$^2$ of the COSMOS-Web survey. One object is spectroscopically confirmed at $z_{\rm…

The ``Little Red Dots'' (LRDs) are red and compact galaxies detected in JWST deep fields, mainly in the redshift range $z=4-8$. Given their compactness and the inferred stellar masses in the hypothesis that LRDs are starburst galaxies, the…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2024-08-29 Carl Audric Guia , Fabio Pacucci , Dale D. Kocevski

Little red dots (LRDs), high-redshift, compact, red objects with V-shaped spectra, are one of the most exciting and perplexing discoveries made by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). While the simplest explanation for LRDs is that they…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-09-05 Amy Secunda , Rachel S. Somerville , Yan-Fei Jiang , Jenny E. Greene , Lukas J. Furtak , Adi Zitrin

JWST has revealed a class of numerous, extremely compact sources, with rest-frame red optical/near-infrared (NIR) and blue ultraviolet (UV) colours, nicknamed "little red dots". We present one of the highest signal-to-noise ratio JWST…

Little Red Dots (LRDs) are compact, red sources discovered by JWST at high redshift ($z \gtrsim 4$), marked by distinctive "V-shaped" spectral energy distributions (SEDs) and often interpreted as rapidly accreting AGNs. Their evolution…

By virtue of their red color, the dust in little red dots (LRDs) has been thought to be of appreciable influence, whether that dust is distributed in a torus around a compact active galactic nucleus (AGN) or diffuse in the interstellar…

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has revealed a previously unknown population of compact, red galaxies at $z \sim 5$, known as "Little Red Dots" (LRDs). With effective radii of $\sim 100$ pc and stellar masses of $10^9-10^{11} \,…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-11-14 Fabio Pacucci , Lars Hernquist , Michiko Fujii

The abundant population of "Little Red Dots" (LRDs)-compact objects with red UV to optical colors and broad Balmer lines at high redshift-is unveiling new insights into the properties of early active galactic nuclei (AGN). Perhaps the most…

We present simulated counterparts of the ``Little Red Dot'' (LRD) galaxies observed with JWST, using the large cosmological hydrodynamic simulation, ASTRID. We create mock observations of the galaxies ($5 \leq z \leq 8$) in ASTRID, and find…

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics · Physics 2026-01-21 Patrick LaChance , Rupert A. C. Croft , Tiziana Di Matteo , Yihao Zhou , Fabio Pacucci , Yueying Ni , Nianyi Chen , Simeon Bird

JWST has revealed a new high-redshift population called little red dots (LRDs). Since LRDs may be in the early phase of black hole growth, identifying them in the early universe is crucial for understanding the formation of the first…

The unprecedented sensitivity of the \textit{James Webb Space Telescope} (\textit{JWST}) has revolutionized our understanding of the early universe. Among the most intriguing \textit{JWST} discoveries are red, very compact objects showing…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-02-07 Muhammad A. Latif , Ammara Aftab , Daniel J. Whalen , Mar Mezcua