James Webb Telescope Discovers Mysterious Never-Before-Seen Space Object

DNVN - Light from a completely new type of cosmic object, tentatively called Cliff, the first candidate for the concept of "black hole star", traveled more than 12 billion light years to reach Earth.

According to research published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, Dr. Anna de Graaff's team (Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Germany) observed Cliff with the James Webb Space Telescope and discovered unusual signals.

Cliff objects may represent a new class of cosmic objects called "star black holes" - Graphic image: MPIA/HdA/T. Müller/A. de Graaff

Over the years, James Webb has recorded many strange objects called “little red dots”. This is what scientists call objects seen from billions of light years away. However, their true origin is still a big question.

Cliff seemed to be the missing piece of the puzzle. The object had a sudden jump in brightness, called a Balmer break, which is common in many celestial bodies. But the sharpness of Cliff’s signal was completely different from that of a typical galaxy or galactic nucleus.

Analysis shows that Cliff glows thanks to a dense layer of hydrogen gas heated to extremely high temperatures. The team suggests that it is actually a monstrous black hole: instead of simply sucking in matter, it is surrounded by a giant layer of gas that glows brightly, giving it the appearance of a star.

Scientists have dubbed this type of object a stellar black hole. They believe that many other “little red dots” may also be of this type and may be the precursors to the supermassive black holes we see in the universe today.

“If black hole stars survive and grow as rapidly as the model predicts, they could explain the emergence of supermassive black holes early in the universe,” said Dr. Graaff.

However, this is just an initial hypothesis. The research team hopes that James Webb will continue to find more similar objects to clarify the true nature of this strange phenomenon.

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Source: https://doanhnghiepvn.vn/cong-nghe/kinh-vien-vong-james-webb-phat-hien-vat-the-vu-tru-bi-an-chua-tung-thay/20250927121941249