Discovery of Early Universe Quasars Reveals Merging Galaxies at Cosmic Dawn
A team of international researchers led by Takuma Izumi has made a ground-breaking discovery, shedding light on the formation of quasars, the brightest objects in the Universe, powered by matter falling into supermassive black holes. The team used the ALMA (Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array) radio telescope to study the earliest known pair of close quasars, significantly supporting the widely accepted theory that the merger of two gas-rich galaxies triggers quasar activity.
Yoshiki Matsuoka at Ehime University in Japan initially discovered this pair of quasars, located in the direction of the constellation Virgo, through images captured by the Subaru Telescope. These quasars existed during the first 900 million years of the Universe, marking them as some of the earliest cosmic structures.
ALMA observations revealed that a “bridge” of gas and dust connects the host galaxies of these quasars, suggesting that the two galaxies are merging. The study further showed that these galaxies are rich in gas, a critical ingredient for new star formation.
The research suggests that this merger will not only intensify quasar activity in the future but also trigger a rapid increase in star formation, a phenomenon known as a “starburst.” The combination of these activities is expected to give rise to a super-bright object in the early Universe, commonly referred to as a “monster galaxy.”
This discovery provides crucial insights into the cosmic processes that shaped the early Universe, offering a glimpse into the origins of some of its most massive and luminous structures.
