A “monster” emerging from the primordial universe has shocked scientists by shining over 40 times the Eddington limit due to an unimaginable behavior.
A research team led by astronomer Julia Scharwächter from the Gemini Observatory and NOIRLab (USA) has reported the discovery of a “impossible” supermassive black hole.
This black hole is the nucleus of galaxy LID-568, which exists in a region of space just 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang event that birthed the universe.
Graphic depicting a dwarf galaxy in the primordial universe with a “monster heart” consuming material rapidly and shining brightly – (Image: NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/J. da Silva/M. Zamani)
What is shocking is that this monster, over 12 billion years old, seems to be consuming material at an astonishing rate, causing it to shine over 40 times the theoretical maximum known as the Eddington limit.
The Eddington limit is the maximum brightness that an object can achieve. For black holes, this brightness is due to the rapid consumption of material, turning it into a quasar, which appears so bright from Earth that it looks like a star.
As the black hole devours material, the incredible friction and gravitational forces heat this material disk to extremely high temperatures, causing it to glow. Importantly, this light generates a form of pressure.
A single photon may not do much, but the explosion of a supermassive black hole’s accretion disk is different.
At a certain point, the outward radiation pressure balances with the inward gravitational force of the black hole, preventing material from moving closer. This is the Eddington limit.
However, with the presence of the “monster heart” of LID-568, the theory that humanity has relied on for decades has officially been broken.
According to Dr. Scharwächter, this extreme case shows that a fast energy-accretion mechanism for black holes may have existed when the universe was just forming.
According to Science Alert, a meticulous analysis of the data suggests that this supermassive black hole – like other supermassive black holes from the primordial universe – may be less massive than the largest black holes we know today.
Although it is larger than Sagittarius A* in the Milky Way galaxy, it weighs only about 7.2 million times the mass of the Sun.
Thus, its accretion rate is even more astonishing. At this rate, the super-Eddington accretion phase would be extremely brief. Researchers were incredibly fortunate to capture this rare moment.
The study has just been published in the scientific journal Nature Astronomy.
