Related papers: Evidence for Early or Efficient Black-Hole Growth
We consider a scenario where supermassive black holes form through direct accumulation of gas at the centre of proto-galaxies. In the first stage, the accumulated gas forms a super-massive star whose core collapses when the nuclear fuel is…
Almost every galaxy in the local Universe is observed to have a massive black hole in the centre. The properties of these black holes are observed to tightly correlate with those of their host galaxy which has been interpreted as…
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…
Supermassive black holes (SMBHs) are common in local galactic nuclei, and SMBHs as massive as several billion solar masses already exist at redshift z=6. These earliest SMBHs may grow by the combination of radiation-pressure-limited…
Overmassive black hole galaxies (OBGs) at redshifts $z \sim$ 10, or 450 Myr after the Big Bang, are one of the most puzzling discoveries by the James Webb Space Telescope to date because they formed by such early epochs and their black-hole…
The high redshifts of the most distant known quasars, and the best estimates of their black hole masses, require that supermassive black holes (SMBHs) must have formed very early in history. Several mechanisms for creating and growing these…
The formation, accretion and growth of supermassive black holes in the early universe are investigated. The accretion rate ${\dot M}$ is calculated using the Bondi accretion rate onto black holes. Starting with initial seed black holes with…
We present calculations on the formation of massive black holes with 10^5 Msun at z > 6 that can be the seeds of supermassive black holes at z > 6. Under the assumption of compact star cluster formation in merging galaxies, star clusters in…
One cannot understand the early appearance of 10^9 solar-mass black holes without invoking anomalously high accretion rates or the creation of exotically massive seeds, neither of which is seen in the local Universe. Recent observations…
Blazars are Active Galactic Nuclei characterized by relativistic jets launched in the vicinity of the central engine (i.e. a supermassive black hole), that are oriented close to our line of sight. Their peculiar orientation makes them very…
Recent surveys suggest that most or all normal galaxies host a massive black hole with 1/100 to 1/1000 of the visible mass of the spheroid of the galaxy. Various lines of argument suggest that these galaxies have merged at least once in our…
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…
The supermassive black holes observed at the centers of almost all present-day galaxies, had a profound impact on their environment. I highlight the principle of self-regulation, by which supermassive black holes grow until they release…
Observational constraints on the birth and early evolution of massive black holes (BHs) come from two extreme regimes. At high redshift, quasars signal the rapid growth of billion-solar-mass BHs and indicate that these objects began…
Some issues relevant for the formation of supermassive black holes are discused and estimates of the event rates for the emission of gravitational waves by coalescing supermassive black hole binaries are given. The models take into account…
This article documents our ongoing search for the elusive "intermediate-mass" black holes. These would bridge the gap between the approximately ten solar mass "stellar-mass" black holes that are the end-product of the life of a massive…
Black holes with hundreds to thousands of solar masses are more massive than can be formed from a single star in the current universe, yet the best candidates for these objects are not located in gas-rich environments where gradual…
We have obtained deep, multi-band imaging observations around three of the most distant known quasars at redshifts z>6. Standard accretion theory predicts that the supermassive black holes present in these quasars were formed at a very…
It has been recently suggested that supermassive black holes at z = 5-6 might form from super-fast (\dot M > 10^4 Msun/yr) accretion occurring in unstable, massive nuclear gas disks produced by mergers of Milky-Way size galaxies.…
We constrain the total accreted mass density in supermassive black holes at z>6, inferred via the upper limit derived from the integrated X-ray emission from a sample of photometrically selected galaxy candidates. Studying galaxies obtained…