New evidence from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory challenges prevailing ideas about how supermassive black holes grow in the centers of galaxies. Astronomers long have thought that a supermassive black hole and the bulge of stars at the center of its host galaxy grow at the same rate–the bigger the bulge, the bigger the black hole. A new study of Chandra data has revealed two nearby galaxies whose supermassive black holes are growing faster than the galaxies themselves.
Above: New results based on the two objects shown here are challenging the prevailing ideas as to how supermassive black holes grow in the centers of galaxies. NGC 4342 and NGC 4291, the two galaxies in the study, are nearby in cosmic terms at distances of 75 million and 85 million light years respectively. In these composite images, X-rays from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory are colored blue, while infrared data from the 2MASS project are seen in red. (NASA/CXC/SAO/A.Bogdan et al; Infrared: 2MASS/UMass/IPAC-Caltech/NASA/NSF)
The mass of a giant black hole at the center of a galaxy typically is a tiny fraction (about 0.2 percent) of the mass contained in the bulge, or region of densely packed stars, surrounding it. The targets of the latest Chandra study, galaxies NGC 4342 and NGC 4291, have black holes that are 10 times to 35 times more massive than they should be compared to their bulges. The new observations with Chandra show that the halos, or massive envelopes of dark matter in which these galaxies reside, also are overweight.
The new study suggests the two supermassive black holes and their evolution are tied to their dark matter halos and they did not grow in tandem with the galactic bulges. In this view, the black holes and dark matter halos are not overweight, but the total mass in the galaxies is too low.
“This gives us more evidence of a link between two of the most mysterious and darkest phenomena in astrophysics — black holes and dark matter — in these galaxies,” said Akos Bogdan of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass, who led the new study.
How can the mass of a black hole grow faster than the stellar mass of its host galaxy? The study’s authors suggest that a large concentration of gas spinning slowly in the galactic center is what the black hole consumes very early in its history. It grows quickly, and as it grows, the amount of gas it can accrete, or swallow, increases along with the energy output from the accretion. Once the black hole reaches a critical mass, outbursts powered by the continued consumption of gas prevent cooling and limits the production of new stars.
“It’s possible that the supermassive black hole reached a hefty size before there were many stars at all in the galaxy,” said Bogdan. “That is a significant change in our way of thinking about how galaxies and black holes evolve together.”
NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra program for the agency’s NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Mass., controls Chandra’s science and flight operations.
