The first black holes
The largest early stars collapse straight into darkness, seeding the giants at the hearts of galaxies.
- When
- Known to
- ± 50 million years
- Era
- First Light, Stelliferous
The most massive Population III stars end not as supernovae but by collapsing directly into black holes of perhaps a hundred solar masses. Some models instead have vast gas clouds collapsing whole into seeds of tens of thousands of solar masses. Which route dominates is unsettled, and it matters: the supermassive black holes observed only a few hundred million years later are difficult to grow from small seeds in the time available.