The Webb Space Telescope has made a groundbreaking discovery, finding the oldest black hole ever detected, just 430 million years after the birth of the universe.
According to a research report published in the scientific journal Nature, this black hole devoured its host galaxy during the “cosmic dawn,” challenging scientists’ understanding of how these celestial behemoths formed.
The black hole’s rapid growth, just 200 million years after the Big Bang, poses new questions for scientists about the formation of black holes.
The black hole was discovered in the direction of Ursa Major in 2016, but its existence was originally missed by the Hubble telescope. However, the James Webb Space Telescope, which surpassed Hubble as the most powerful space telescope in 2022, made this groundbreaking discovery.
The discovery of this ancient black hole has sparked new theories about how black holes form in the early universe. The findings have also raised questions about the possible formation of these black holes through the explosion of very large stars or the direct collapse of dense gas clouds.
Study co-author Jan Scholtz hopes that the Webb telescope and other upcoming telescopes will find more of these black holes in the universe’s early history. This discovery is just the beginning of the groundbreaking insights that astronomers may gain into the formation of black holes.