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Ancient star collisions could explain mysterious Little Red Dots and 'impossible' black holes
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- DeepHorus
New simulations suggest that star collisions were common in the early universe, potentially explaining JWST’s mysterious Little Red Dots and “impossible” supermassive black holes. The team found early stellar systems were densely packed, allowing frequent encounters. The work may connect two major cosmic puzzles.
The study, involving UCLA’s Claire Williams, simulated early cosmic environments. It found slow collisions could cause repeated mergers, producing single over-massive stars. At the end of their lives, such stars could collapse into larger-than-usual black holes, possibly seeds of the first supermassive black holes.
JWST has spotted supermassive black holes before the universe was 1 billion years old. Standard growth should need at least 1 billion years to reach millions or billions of solar masses. Intermediate-mass seeds of 100 to 100,000 solar masses have been proposed, but no single star should form one under modern conditions.
In dense early clusters, repeated mergers could build a star as massive as an entire cluster. Williams said such a gigantic star may have no option but to collapse into a massive black hole. This offers a natural birthplace for black-hole seeds.
Modern galaxy cores remain dense but are not conducive to these collisions. Existing supermassive black holes speed up orbiting stars, making collisions high-speed and destructive. That prevents overmassive stars from forming today.
The model could also bear on Little Red Dots, which JWST routinely finds in the early universe. Researchers call them a hot topic, comparing studies to blind people describing an elephant. The same dense environments can supply stars and gas that influence later black-hole growth.
The scenario, if confirmed, would help explain how black holes grew so big so fast and what Little Red Dots represent. It provides a testable pathway for early black-hole seeding. Future work must connect simulations with JWST observations.
