When the James Webb Space Telescope started working in 2022, it showed astronomers a puzzle. In images of the early universe, there were small, bright red dots. Scientists did not know what they were. Now, a team of researchers has found an answer. They have identified a new kind of object in space called a black hole star. The first one found is named MoM-BH*-1. Its light has traveled for billions of years, showing us how the universe looked about 660 million years after the Big Bang. This object is huge, as wide as our solar system. It also gives off 100 billion times more energy than a normal star.
Normal stars make energy through nuclear fusion. But this new object works differently. Rohan Naidu, a lead researcher, explained that fusion cannot create so much energy. The energy comes from a central black hole eating nearby material very quickly. The discovery was published in the journal Nature. The team was studying why some early galaxies looked very bright. They thought the red color might be from dust, like how wildfire smoke can make the sky look red. However, studying the light showed the red color came from a thick shell of gas around the object. The scientists used computer models to understand it. They concluded that a black hole, about 100,000 times the mass of our Sun, is at the center. A very dense layer of hydrogen gas surrounds it, acting like a star's surface and sending out energy.
This discovery might explain the red dots seen in the James Webb telescope's images. Researchers now think these dots are other black hole stars. This finding changes how scientists think about the early universe. It suggests black holes might have formed first and then pulled in material to create galaxies. The object MoM-BH*-1 is expected to merge with a nearby galaxy in about 100 million years. This event could explain the appearance of other red dots seen in the universe.