The first stars of the universe were really different than the stars we see today. In the early universe, dark matter might have been more concentrated than it is now, and it may have powered strange outstanding items known as dark stars.
Because dark matter and routine matter act likewise under gravity, clumps of dark matter in the early universe might have collected clouds of hydrogen and helium around them. These high-energy particles would avoid the cloud from collapsing, similar to the method nuclear blend sustains a routine star.
These dark stars would have been enormous, with a diameter tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of times broader than the Sun. The Nancy Grace Roman space telescope, previously called WFIRST, might be powerful enough to discover them.
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The very first stars of the universe were extremely different than the stars we see today. In the early universe, dark matter could have been more concentrated than it is now, and it might have powered unusual excellent things known as dark stars.
Artist analysis of a dark star. Credit: University of Utah
According to a current paper published on the arxiv, Roman may be able to observe supermassive dark stars with masses greater than 100,000 Suns. Dark stars on this scale werent likely common. With the aid of gravitational lensing, Roman might be able to see a dark star of that mass, however the authors propose a much better technique, integrating observations of Roman with the James Webb Space Telescope.
Their idea is to recognize dark star prospects utilizing Roman, with the understanding that the photometric observations will not have the ability to differentiate dark stars from little young galaxies. One function that distinguishes the galaxies from dark stars is that the latter should show a helium emission line referred to as? 1640, which Webb can spot. Roman is better suited for discovering prospects, and Webb can verify them. Its an outstanding example of how the strengths of different telescopes can match each other.
If this method succeeds in the next decade, it could help astronomers comprehend a different cosmological secret, that of supermassive great voids. We still dont comprehend how such huge black holes could form so quickly in the early universe, however one concept is that they might have been seeded by these dark stars. As their dark matter cores stopped producing energy, these stars may have collapsed quickly enough to form an enormous black hole, which might grow into a supermassive black hole in time.
Theres much we could gain from the dim light of a dark star.
Reference: Zhang, Saiyang, Cosmin Ilie, and Katherine Freese. “Detectability of Supermassive Dark Stars with the Roman Space Telescope.” arXiv preprint arXiv:2306.11606 (2023 ).
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Their concept is to recognize dark star candidates using Roman, with the understanding that the photometric observations wont be able to identify dark stars from small young galaxies. We still do not understand how such huge black holes might form so quickly in the early universe, however one idea is that they might have been seeded by these dark stars. As their dark matter cores stopped producing energy, these stars may have collapsed rapidly enough to form a massive black hole, which could grow into a supermassive black hole in time.