학술논문

A CEERS Discovery of an Accreting Supermassive Black Hole 570 Myr after the Big Bang: Identifying a Progenitor of Massive z > 6 Quasars
Document Type
article
Source
The Astrophysical Journal Letters, Vol 953, Iss 2, p L29 (2023)
Subject
AGN host galaxies
Black holes
High-redshift galaxies
Galaxies
Infrared spectroscopy
Spectroscopy
Astrophysics
QB460-466
Language
English
ISSN
2041-8213
2041-8205
Abstract
We report the discovery of an accreting supermassive black hole at z = 8.679. This galaxy, denoted here as CEERS_1019, was previously discovered as a Ly α -break galaxy by Hubble with a Ly α redshift from Keck. As part of the Cosmic Evolution Early Release Science (CEERS) survey, we have observed this source with JWST/NIRSpec, MIRI, NIRCam, and NIRCam/WFSS and uncovered a plethora of emission lines. The H β line is best fit by a narrow plus a broad component, where the latter is measured at 2.5 σ with an FWHM ∼1200 km s ^−1 . We conclude this originates in the broadline region of an active galactic nucleus (AGN). This is supported by the presence of weak high-ionization lines (N V, N IV], and C III]), as well as a spatial point-source component. The implied mass of the black hole (BH) is log ( M _BH / M _⊙ ) = 6.95 ± 0.37, and we estimate that it is accreting at 1.2 ± 0.5 times the Eddington limit. The 1–8 μ m photometric spectral energy distribution shows a continuum dominated by starlight and constrains the host galaxy to be massive (log M/M _⊙ ∼9.5) and highly star-forming (star formation rate, or SFR ∼ 30 M _⊙ yr ^−1 ; log sSFR ∼ − 7.9 yr ^−1 ). The line ratios show that the gas is metal-poor ( Z / Z _⊙ ∼ 0.1), dense ( n _e ∼ 10 ^3 cm ^−3 ), and highly ionized (log U ∼ − 2.1). We use this present highest-redshift AGN discovery to place constraints on BH seeding models and find that a combination of either super-Eddington accretion from stellar seeds or Eddington accretion from very massive BH seeds is required to form this object.