JWST's Little Red Dots as collapsed Supermassive Dark Stars
Abstract
The nature of the ``Little Red Dots'' (LRDs) is one of the most profound mysteries posed by the JWST data. One promising class of models that can reproduce the observed LRDs spectra and morphology are quasi-stars: massive envelopes surrounding accreting black holes formed via the collapse of supermassive stars (SMSs). However, the canonical SMS pathway relies on a highly restricted set of environmental and structural conditions: strong Lyman--Werner (LW) backgrounds to suppress H2 cooling, high and sustained gas inflow rates to enforce entropy stratified envelopes, and assume non-zero rotational support in order to prevent GR instability collapse before ∼ 106 M⊙. Here we show that supermassive dark stars (SMDSs), powered by dark matter (DM) annihilation rather than nuclear burning, naturally satisfy the key structural and energetic requirements for quasi-star (QS) formation while relaxing {\it all} of those restrictive conditions listed above. Moreover, quasi-stars formed through the SMDS pathway are born with prompt BH masses (≳ 10%) of the progenitor mass. They therefore enter directly into a late-stage quasi-star regime; subsequently the envelope expands and cools until its photosphere reaches the zero-metallicity opacity limit (Teff∼3000-6000 K). Those cool, optically thick, unresolved photospheres can reproduce key features of many JWST LRDs.
Related
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BibTeX
@misc{ilie2026jwsts,
title = {{JWST's Little Red Dots as collapsed Supermassive Dark Stars}},
author = {Cosmin Ilie},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2606.02539},
eprint = {2606.02539},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.02539},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - JWST's Little Red Dots as collapsed Supermassive Dark Stars
AU - Cosmin Ilie
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/08
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2606.02539
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.02539
AB - The nature of the ``Little Red Dots'' (LRDs) is one of the most profound mysteries posed by the JWST data. One promising class of models that can reproduce the observed LRDs spectra and morphology are quasi-stars: massive envelopes surrounding accreting black holes formed via the collapse of supermassive stars (SMSs). However, the canonical SMS pathway relies on a highly restricted set of environmental and structural conditions: strong Lyman--Werner (LW) backgrounds to suppress H_2 cooling, high and sustained gas inflow rates to enforce entropy stratified envelopes, and assume non-zero rotational support in order to prevent GR instability collapse before ∼ 10^6 M_⊙. Here we show that supermassive dark stars (SMDSs), powered by dark matter (DM) annihilation rather than nuclear burning, naturally satisfy the key structural and energetic requirements for quasi-star (QS) formation while relaxing {\it all} of those restrictive conditions listed above. Moreover, quasi-stars formed through the SMDS pathway are born with prompt BH masses (≳ 10%) of the progenitor mass. They therefore enter directly into a late-stage quasi-star regime; subsequently the envelope expands and cools until its photosphere reaches the zero-metallicity opacity limit (T_eff∼3000-6000 K). Those cool, optically thick, unresolved photospheres can reproduce key features of many JWST LRDs.
ER -