May 25, 2016

Artistic representation of a supermassive black hole seed. The inset boxes show a candidate seen by Chandra (top) and by Hubble (bottom) (Image X-ray: NASA/CXC/Scuola Normale Superiore/F. Pacucci, et al. Optical: NASA/STScI. Illustration: NASA/CXC/M. Weiss)

An article that will be published in the journal “Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society” describes a research on the origin of supermassive black holes. A team of Italian scientists led by Fabio Pacucci of Scuola Normale Superiore of Pisa used NASA’s space telescopes to identify two ancient objects that represent the best candidates black hole “seeds” found so far.