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The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has recently discovered a population of compact, red sources at z > 4 known as "Little Red Dots" (LRDs). They are characterized by their V-shaped continuum spectra and prominent broad Balmer emission…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2026-05-13 Weiyu Ding , Xu Kong , Wei-Jian Guo , Hu Zou , Jialai Wang , Fujia Li , Hongxin Zhang , Jie Song , Jingyi Zhang , Niu Li , Wen-Xiong Li

"Little red dots" (LRDs) represent a new population of astronomical objects uncovered by JWST whose nature remains debated. Although many LRDs are suspected as active galactic nuclei (AGN), they show little variability on days-years…

JWST has revealed a substantial population of "Little Red Dots" (LRDs) at $z>4$, challenging conventional AGN frameworks. However, the low-redshift regime remains largely unexplored. In the second paper of the (LRDs)$^2$ series, we present…

Recently, a large number of compact sources at $z > 4$ with blue UV slopes and extremely red rest-frame optical slopes have been found in James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) extragalactic surveys. As a subsample of these sources, commonly…

One of the most surprising results of early James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) observations is the discovery of an abundance of red, compact, broad-line objects dubbed "little red dots" (LRDs) at $z>4$. Their spatial density…

The James Webb Space Telescope has detected massive black holes (BHs) with masses of $\sim 10^{6-8}~M_\odot$ within the first billion years of the universe. One of the remarkable findings is the identification of "Little Red Dots" (LRDs), a…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-07-17 Kohei Inayoshi

Among the most remarkable results from JWST is the discovery of abundant, compact, and very red sources in the early Universe known as "Little Red Dots" (LRDs). The relative degree to which starlight and active galactic nuclei (AGN) drive…

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 James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has discovered a new population of objects, the Little Red Dots (LRDs), characterized by V-shaped spectra indicative of strong breaks around the Balmer limit and compact morphology that gave them their…

We analyze 99 photometrically selected Little Red Dots (LRDs) at $z \approx 4-8$ in the GOODS fields, leveraging ultra-deep JADES NIRCam short-wavelength (SW) data. We examine the morphology of 30 LRDs, while the remaining 69 appear…

Little Red Dots (LRDs) are a new class of compact extragalactic objects, with a v-shaped optical spectral energy distribution breaking close to the Balmer break wavelength, and broad, typically exponentially-shaped lines. They are believed…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-10-09 G. P. Nikopoulos , D. Watson , A. Sneppen , V. Rusakov , K. E. Heintz , J. Witstok , G. Brammer

We present a statistical study on the origins of the UV continuum and narrow/broad emission lines in little red dots (LRDs), presumably involving active galactic nuclei (AGNs). Leveraging all archived JWST/NIRSpec data, we build a sample of…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2026-05-12 Yoshihisa Asada , Kohei Inayoshi , Qinyue Fei , Seiji Fujimoto , Chris Willott

JWST has revealed a population of compact galaxies in the early Universe with broad emission lines and strong Balmer breaks; among them the so-called ''little red dots'' (LRDs). Their nature remains uncertain with hypotheses including…

JWST has unveiled an abundant population of compact broad-line emitters largely at $z\gtrsim4$, the Little Red Dots (LRDs), which might represent a previously unprobed supermassive black hole evolution channel predominant at high redshift.…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2026-05-15 Kevin Park , Alberto Torralba , Jorryt Matthee , Sara Mascia , Zoltán Haiman , Rohan P. Naidu , Anna de Graaff

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has uncovered a new population of candidate broad-line AGN emerging in the early Universe, named ''little red dots'' (LRDs) because of their compactness and red colors at optical wavelengths. LRDs…

Early JWST studies found an apparent population of massive, compact galaxies at redshifts $z\gtrsim7$. Recently three of these galaxies were shown to have prominent Balmer breaks, demonstrating that their light at $\lambda_{\rm rest} \sim…

Recent JWST observations have revealed a population of red, compact, high-redshift objects called 'Little Red Dots'(LRD), whose host components have remained largely unconstrained, possibly due to their extreme compactness. Current…

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has uncovered an abundant population of compact, extremely red, and X-ray weak objects at $z\gtrsim4$, knows as ``Little Red Dots" (LRDs). These objects exhibit spectral energy distributions that…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2024-10-29 Hai-Long Huang , Jun-Qian Jiang , Jibin He , Yu-Tong Wang , Yun-Song Piao