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Peer-reviewedCC BYNature

A gas-enshrouded and gas-reddened black hole at cosmic dawn

  • Rohan P. Naidu1,2
  • Jorryt Matthee3
  • Harley Katz4
  • Anna de Graaff5
  • Pascal A. Oesch6,7,8
  • Aaron Smith9
  • Jenny E. Greene10
  • Gabriel Brammer6,8
  • Andrea Weibel7
  • Raphael E. Hviding5
  • John Chisholm11
  • Ivo Labbé12
42 more authors
  • Robert A. Simcoe13
  • Callum Witten7
  • Wendy Q. Sun13
  • Hakim Atek14
  • Josephine F. W. Baggen15
  • Sirio Belli16
  • Rachel Bezanson17
  • Leindert Boogaard18
  • Sownak Bose19
  • R. J. Bouwens18
  • Alba Covelo-Paz7
  • Pratika Dayal20
  • Yoshinobu Fudamoto21
  • Lukas J. Furtak22
  • Emma Giovinazzo7
  • Andy D. Goulding10
  • Max B. Gronke23
  • K. E. Heintz6,7,8
  • Michaela Hirschmann24
  • Garth D. Illingworth25
  • Akio K. Inoue26,27
  • Benjamin D. Johnson28
  • Joel Leja29,30,31
  • E. Leonova32
  • Ian McConachie33
  • Michael V. Maseda33
  • Priyamvada Natarajan15,34,35
  • Erica June Nelson36
  • David J. Setton10
  • Irene Shivaei37
  • David Sobral38,39
  • Mauro Stefanon40
  • Sandro Tacchella
  • Sune Toft6,8
  • Alberto Torralba3
  • Pieter van Dokkum34
  • Arjen van der Wel
  • Marta Volonteri14
  • Fabian Walter5
  • Bingjie Wang29,30,31
  • Darach J. Watson6,8
  • Katherine E. Whitaker6
40 affiliations
  1. 1Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawai'i, Honolulu, HI, USA. [email protected]
  2. 2MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Cambridge, MA, USA. [email protected]
  3. 3Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA), Klosterneuburg, Austria
  4. 4Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
  5. 5Max-Planck-Institut für Astronomie, Heidelberg, Germany
  6. 6Cosmic Dawn Center (DAWN), Copenhagen, Denmark
  7. 7Department of Astronomy, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
  8. 8Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
  9. 9Department of Physics, The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, TX, USA
  10. 10Department of Astrophysical Sciences, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA
  11. 11Department of Astronomy, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA
  12. 12Centre for Astrophysics and Supercomputing, Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
  13. 13MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Cambridge, MA, USA
  14. 14Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, Paris, France
  15. 15Department of Astronomy, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
  16. 16Dipartimento di Fisica e Astronomia, Università di Bologna, Bologna, Italy
  17. 17Department of Physics and Astronomy and PITT PACC, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
  18. 18Leiden Observatory, Leiden University, Leiden, The Netherlands
  19. 19Institute for Computational Cosmology, Department of Physics, Durham University, Durham, UK
  20. 20Kapteyn Astronomical Institute, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands
  21. 21Center for Frontier Science, Chiba University, Chiba, Japan
  22. 22Department of Physics, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Be'er-Sheva, Israel
  23. 23Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics, Garching, Germany
  24. 24Institute of Physics, Lab for galaxy evolution and spectral modelling, EPFL, Observatory of Sauverny, Geneva, Switzerland
  25. 25Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of California Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA, USA
  26. 26Department of Physics, School of Advanced Science and Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan
  27. 27Waseda Research Institute for Science and Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan
  28. 28Center for Astrophysics - Harvard and Smithsonian, Cambridge, MA, USA
  29. 29Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA
  30. 30Institute for Computational and Data Sciences, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA
  31. 31Institute for Gravitation and the Cosmos, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA
  32. 32GRAPPA, Anton Pannekoek Institute for Astronomy and Institute of High-Energy Physics, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
  33. 33Department of Astronomy, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA
  34. 34Department of Physics, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
  35. 35Yale Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
  36. 36Department for Astrophysical and Planetary Science, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA
  37. 37Centro de Astrobiología (CAB), CSIC-INTA, Madrid, Spain
  38. 38BNP Paribas Corporate & Institutional Banking, Lisbon, Portugal
  39. 39Departamento de Física, Faculdade de Ciencias, Universidade de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal
  40. 40Departament d'Astronomia i Astrofísica, Universitat de València, València, Spain
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Abstract

The physical processes that led to the formation of billion-solar-mass black holes within the first 700 million years of cosmic time, a period known as cosmic dawn, remain a puzzle 1 . Several theoretical scenarios have been proposed to seed and rapidly grow black holes 2–4 , but direct observations of these mechanisms remain elusive. Here we present a source 660 million years after the Big Bang that exhibits singular properties: among the largest hydrogen Balmer breaks reported at any redshift, broad multi-peaked Hβ emission, and Balmer line absorption in several transitions. We model this source as an enshrouded black hole in which the Balmer break and absorption features are a result of extremely dense, turbulent gas forming a dust-free envelope around a supermassive black hole 5,6 . This source may provide evidence of an early black hole embedded in dense gas—a theoretical configuration proposed to rapidly grow black holes by super-Eddington accretion 7,8 . Radiation from the black hole seems to dominate almost all observed light, leaving limited room for contribution from its host galaxy. If the source merged with its brighter neighbour, it would resemble the recently discovered ‘little red dots’ with perplexing spectral energy distributions 9–11 . The redness of the black hole is due to gas, not dust 12,13 , and scattering, not kinematics, gives rise to the complex line shapes and luminosities—black hole masses of these sources may therefore be overestimated by orders of magnitude.

Related

  1. Little Red Dot − Host Galaxy = Black Hole Star: A Gas-Enshrouded Heart at the Center of Every Little Red Dot
    Wendy Q. Sun, Rohan P. Naidu, Jorryt Matthee +30
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  2. Little red dots host black hole stars: a unified family of gas-reddened AGN revealed by JWST /NIRSpec spectroscopy
    Anna de Graaff, Raphael E Hviding, Rohan P. Naidu +34
    Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical SocietyPeer-reviewedCC BYFull text130 citedGalaxiesOpenAlex
  3. Nanohertz Gravitational-Wave Constraints on Supermassive Binary Black Holes at Cosmic Dawn
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  4. Primordial Black Hole and Gravitational Wave by Peaked Cosmic Perturbations from Axion Curvaton
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  5. Direct measures of black hole masses through cosmic time
    Roberto Decarli, Sabine Thater, Ivan Delvecchio +16
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Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@article{naidu2026gasenshrouded,
  title = {{A gas-enshrouded and gas-reddened black hole at cosmic dawn}},
  author = {Rohan P. Naidu and Jorryt Matthee and Harley Katz and Anna de Graaff and Pascal A. Oesch and Aaron Smith and Jenny E. Greene and Gabriel Brammer and Andrea Weibel and Raphael E. Hviding and John Chisholm and Ivo Labbé and Robert A. Simcoe and Callum Witten and Wendy Q. Sun and Hakim Atek and Josephine F. W. Baggen and Sirio Belli and Rachel Bezanson and Leindert Boogaard and Sownak Bose and R. J. Bouwens and Alba Covelo-Paz and Pratika Dayal and Yoshinobu Fudamoto and Lukas J. Furtak and Emma Giovinazzo and Andy D. Goulding and Max B. Gronke and K. E. Heintz and Michaela Hirschmann and Garth D. Illingworth and Akio K. Inoue and Benjamin D. Johnson and Joel Leja and E. Leonova and Ian McConachie and Michael V. Maseda and Priyamvada Natarajan and Erica June Nelson and David J. Setton and Irene Shivaei and David Sobral and Mauro Stefanon and Sandro Tacchella and Sune Toft and Alberto Torralba and Pieter van Dokkum and Arjen van der Wel and Marta Volonteri and Fabian Walter and Bingjie Wang and Darach J. Watson and Katherine E. Whitaker},
  journal = {Nature},
  year = {2026},
  month = aug,
  doi = {10.1038/s41586-026-10846-4},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-10846-4},
  note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY  - JOUR
TI  - A gas-enshrouded and gas-reddened black hole at cosmic dawn
AU  - Rohan P. Naidu
AU  - Jorryt Matthee
AU  - Harley Katz
AU  - Anna de Graaff
AU  - Pascal A. Oesch
AU  - Aaron Smith
AU  - Jenny E. Greene
AU  - Gabriel Brammer
AU  - Andrea Weibel
AU  - Raphael E. Hviding
AU  - John Chisholm
AU  - Ivo Labbé
AU  - Robert A. Simcoe
AU  - Callum Witten
AU  - Wendy Q. Sun
AU  - Hakim Atek
AU  - Josephine F. W. Baggen
AU  - Sirio Belli
AU  - Rachel Bezanson
AU  - Leindert Boogaard
AU  - Sownak Bose
AU  - R. J. Bouwens
AU  - Alba Covelo-Paz
AU  - Pratika Dayal
AU  - Yoshinobu Fudamoto
AU  - Lukas J. Furtak
AU  - Emma Giovinazzo
AU  - Andy D. Goulding
AU  - Max B. Gronke
AU  - K. E. Heintz
AU  - Michaela Hirschmann
AU  - Garth D. Illingworth
AU  - Akio K. Inoue
AU  - Benjamin D. Johnson
AU  - Joel Leja
AU  - E. Leonova
AU  - Ian McConachie
AU  - Michael V. Maseda
AU  - Priyamvada Natarajan
AU  - Erica June Nelson
AU  - David J. Setton
AU  - Irene Shivaei
AU  - David Sobral
AU  - Mauro Stefanon
AU  - Sandro Tacchella
AU  - Sune Toft
AU  - Alberto Torralba
AU  - Pieter van Dokkum
AU  - Arjen van der Wel
AU  - Marta Volonteri
AU  - Fabian Walter
AU  - Bingjie Wang
AU  - Darach J. Watson
AU  - Katherine E. Whitaker
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/08/12
JO  - Nature
DO  - 10.1038/s41586-026-10846-4
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-10846-4
AB  - The physical processes that led to the formation of billion-solar-mass black holes within the first 700 million years of cosmic time, a period known as cosmic dawn, remain a puzzle 1 . Several theoretical scenarios have been proposed to seed and rapidly grow black holes 2–4 , but direct observations of these mechanisms remain elusive. Here we present a source 660 million years after the Big Bang that exhibits singular properties: among the largest hydrogen Balmer breaks reported at any redshift, broad multi-peaked Hβ emission, and Balmer line absorption in several transitions. We model this source as an enshrouded black hole in which the Balmer break and absorption features are a result of extremely dense, turbulent gas forming a dust-free envelope around a supermassive black hole 5,6 . This source may provide evidence of an early black hole embedded in dense gas—a theoretical configuration proposed to rapidly grow black holes by super-Eddington accretion 7,8 . Radiation from the black hole seems to dominate almost all observed light, leaving limited room for contribution from its host galaxy. If the source merged with its brighter neighbour, it would resemble the recently discovered ‘little red dots’ with perplexing spectral energy distributions 9–11 . The redness of the black hole is due to gas, not dust 12,13 , and scattering, not kinematics, gives rise to the complex line shapes and luminosities—black hole masses of these sources may therefore be overestimated by orders of magnitude.
SN  - 0028-0836
SN  - 1476-4687
ER  -