Astronomers have discovered the most distant and therefore oldest known black hole. This black hole hiding in the galaxy called GN-z11 is older than the age predicted by the universe.

GN-z11 is approximately 32 billion light-years from Earth and was the most distant known galaxy for a time after its discovery in 2016. Before you jump into the comments to say that such a distance is impossible and that nothing can be further than 13.8 billion light years (the age of the universe), remember that the universe is expanding at an increasing rate, so there is now more space between them. . us and the galaxy as it was when the light left it.

In any case, to get a better look at this distant galaxy, astronomers are now using the powerful infrared eye of the James Webb Space Telescope. They were able to detect the hot ultraviolet glow of the accretion disk, the swirling dust and gas emitting a supermassive black hole. This makes it the most distant black hole ever observed, and based on its size, the team estimates it is around a billion years old.

This creates a serious problem. Thanks to the speed limit of light, we see GN-z11 as it was 13.4 billion years ago, just 400 million years after the Big Bang. Currently, the universe is not old enough to sustain this black hole.

This suggests that our models of black hole formation and growth may need some adjustment. Proposed alternatives are that they form by the collapse of huge clouds of gas, making them larger to begin with and giving them an advantage in growth called “superior black holes.” Other ideas suggest that black holes with more matter nearby could feed and grow faster than we currently think. Or both of these models can work together.

“It is too early to see such a massive black hole in the universe, so we have to consider other ways of their formation,” said Professor Roberto Maiolino, lead author of the study. “Very early galaxies were extremely rich in gas, so they were like a buffet for black holes.”

This is not the first object discovered by James Webb that appears overdeveloped for its age. The telescope has already detected a number of “incredibly” massive galaxies across the universe that appear to have more mass than previously thought. Others showed Milky Way-like bar structures earlier than models predicted they should form.

Astronomers have tried to explain the results by positing everything from galaxies going through “starburst” phases to hypothetical stars fueled by dark matter annihilation that resemble galaxies this far away. Some even go so far as to suggest that the universe may be twice as old as we think.

Only further observations will help unravel what turns out to be the main cosmological mystery. The researchers of the new study plan to use future Webb data to find more black hole seeds.