Low-mass black holes as the remnants of primordial black hole formation

• Published in: Nature communications 2012-12, Vol.3 (1), p.1304-1304, Article 1304
• Main Author: Greene, Jenny E.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: 639/766/33/34; Humanities and Social Sciences; multidisciplinary; review-article; Science; Science (multidisciplinary)
• ISSN: 2041-1723; 2041-1723
• DOI: 10.1038/ncomms2314

Between low-end stellar-mass black holes and top-end supermassive black holes, lie the elusive intermediate black holes. Jenny Greene reviews the search for these black holes in galaxy centres, which should indicate if supermassive black holes grew from stellar-mass ones or if a more complex process was needed. Bridging the gap between the approximately ten solar mass ‘stellar mass’ black holes and the ‘supermassive’ black holes of millions to billions of solar masses are the elusive ‘intermediate-mass’ black holes. Their discovery is key to understanding whether supermassive black holes can grow from stellar-mass black holes or whether a more exotic process accelerated their growth soon after the Big Bang. Currently, tentative evidence suggests that the progenitors of supermassive black holes were formed as ∼10 4 –10 5   M ⊙ black holes via the direct collapse of gas. Ongoing searches for intermediate-mass black holes at galaxy centres will help shed light on this formation mechanism.