The James Webb Space Telescope discovered a group of mysterious small red dot objects in the deep space of the universe. Their extremely reddish characteristics have long puzzled the astronomical community.The team of Professor Wu Qingwen of Huazhong University of Science and Technology published the latest results in "Nature Astronomy" and successfully solved this cosmic mystery., providing key answers to understanding the evolution of early galaxies and black holes.
The Little Red Dot is an extremely dense and bright object in the early universe. Its size is much smaller than that of ordinary galaxies, but its color is unusually reddish. The traditional view is that the red color comes from the reddening effect of interstellar dust, but observations show that the dust content of these celestial bodies is extremely low, making it difficult for the original theory to be established.
Wu Qingwen's team proposed a new explanation. The small red dot itself appears red and has nothing to do with dust.
The Little Red Dot Galaxy is extremely dense and thousands of times smaller than ordinary galaxies.
The team explained: The accretion disk of the supermassive black hole in the center of the galaxy is divided into two regions: the inner and outer regions. The temperature in the inner region is tens of thousands of degrees Celsius, and the radiation is bluer;Under the influence of gravitational instability and turbulent heating, the temperature in the outer region is maintained at 2000 to 4000 degrees Celsius. The radiation wavelength falls in the visible to near-infrared band, showing extremely red characteristics.
The superposition of radiation from the inner and outer disks forms a unique V-shaped spectral structure, which is highly consistent with the Webb telescope observation data.
This mechanism not only perfectly explains the source of the red color of the small red dot, but also reveals that it may be an early form of the co-evolution of galaxies and black holes. As galaxies continue to grow, they will eventually gradually evolve into ordinary galaxies.
This achievement breaks through traditional understanding and provides a new perspective for human exploration of the early structure formation of the universe. It also allows China to achieve another important breakthrough in the field of deep space astrophysics research.