Related papers: Massive black hole seeds from low angular momentum…
We suggest that high-mass black holes; i.e., black holes of several solar masses, can be formed in binaries with low-mass main-sequence companions, provided that the hydrogen envelope of the massive star is removed in common envelope…
We use a simple model of spheroid formation to explore the relationship between the creation of stars and dust in a massive proto galaxy and the growth of its central black hole. This model predicts that sub-mm luminosity peaks after only ~…
The first stars in the universe, forming at redshifts z>15 in minihalos with masses of order 10^6 Msun, may leave behind black holes as their remnants. These objects could conceivably serve as "seeds" for much larger black holes observed at…
We propose a model in which intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) with mass of ~10000 Msun are formed in early dark matter halos. We carry out detailed stellar evolution calculations for accreting primordial stars including annihilation…
With detections of quasars powered by increasingly massive black holes (BHs) at increasingly early times in cosmic history over the past decade, there has been correspondingly rapid progress made on the theory of early BH formation and…
The tight relationship between the masses of black holes and galaxy spheroids in nearby galaxies implies a causal connection between the growth of these two components. Optically luminous quasars host the most prodigious accreting black…
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)…
Based on the previously formulated theory of spherical perturbations in the cosmological medium of self-gravitating scalarly charged fermions with the Higgs scalar interaction and the similarity properties of such models, the formation of…
We argue that supermassive black hole growth in AGN occurs via sequences of randomly--oriented accretion discs with angular momentum limited by self--gravity. These stably co-- or counter--align with the black hole spin with almost equal…
Recent observations have found a large number of supermassive black holes already in place in the first few hundred million years after Big Bang. The channels of formation and growth of these early, massive black holes are not clear, with…
I review scenarios for the assembly of supermassive black holes (MBHs) at the center of galaxies that trace their hierarchical build-up far up in the dark matter halo "merger tree". Monte Carlo realizations of the merger hierarchy in a LCDM…
We explore the effect of varying the mass of the seed black hole on the resulting black hole mass - bulge mass relation at z ~ 0, using a semi-analytic model of galaxy formation combined with large cosmological N-body simulations. We…
We investigate the black hole mass function at $z\sim5$ using XQz5, our recent sample of the most luminous quasars between the redshifts $4.5 < z < 5.3$. We include 72 quasars with black hole masses estimated from velocity-broadened…
The origin and properties of black hole seeds that grow to produce the detected population of supermassive black holes are unconstrained at present. Despite the existence of several potentially feasible channels for the production of…
Runaway collisions in dense clusters may lead to the formation of supermassive black hole (SMBH) seeds, and this process can be further enhanced by accretion, as recent models of SMBH seed formation in Population III star clusters have…
The gravothermal core collapse of self-interacting dark matter halos provides a compelling mechanism for seeding supermassive black holes in the early Universe. In this scenario, a small fraction of a halo, approximately $1\%$ of its mass,…
The advent of new and near-future observatories probing the earliest epochs of the Universe has opened the opportunity to investigate the formation and growth of the first massive black holes (MBHs). Additionally, the use of high resolution…
We study the observational constraints on the cosmic evolution of the relationships between the massive black hole (MBH) mass (M_bh) and the stellar mass (M^*_sph; or velocity dispersion \sigma) of the host galaxy/spheroid. Assuming that…
The origin of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) is a key open question for contemporary astrophysics and cosmology. Here we review the features of a cosmological model of SMBH formation from Pop III.1 seeds, i.e., remnants of metal-free…
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has revealed low-luminosity active galactic nuclei (AGNs) at redshifts of $z\gtrsim 4-7$, many of which host accreting massive black holes (BHs) with BH-to-galaxy mass ($M_{\rm BH}/M_{\star}$) ratios…