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The first large black holes in the universe likely formed and grew deep inside gigantic, starlike cocoons that smothered their powerful x-ray radiation and prevented surrounding gases from being blown away, says a new study led by the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Cambridge, MA - The constellation of Orion is a hotbed of massive star formation, most prominently in the Great Nebula that sits in Orion's sword. The glowing gas of the Nebula is powered by a group of young massive stars, but behind it is a cluster of younger stars and clumps of gas. Still gathering together under gravity's pull, these gas clumps will eventually ignite into stars.

MILANO - Sembrava solo un esercizio teorico quando all’inizio dell’anno due ricercatori proponevano la creazione di un buco nero in laboratorio. Ora Tie Jun Cui e Qiang Cheng della Southeast University di Nanchino (Cina) lo hanno realizzato tra la meraviglia degli stessi teorici. La realizzazione è interessante per le prospettive pratiche che già si immaginano.

Since its discovery 45 years ago, Cygnus X-1 has been one of the most intensively studied cosmic X-ray sources. About a decade after its discovery, Cygnus X-1 secured a place in the history of astronomy when a combination of X-ray and optical observations led to the conclusion that it was a black hole, the first such identification.

Old stars are keys to understanding the nature of the first stars and the earliest stages of the formation of the universe. Observations with the Subaru Telescope, fitted with its High Dispersion Spectrograph (HDS), have yielded data about the chemical composition of an old, bright star—BD+44 493— that shed light on how the early stars may have developed during the infancy of the universe.

A new supercomputer simulation designed to track the fate of the universe’s first black holes finds that, counter to expectations, they couldn’t efficiently gorge themselves on nearby gas. The findings have implications for understanding the formation of galaxies and of the giant black holes that reside in their centers.

SYDNEY: Astronomers have unveiled both the biggest star and the most distant black hole ever found. These twin discoveries bring experts a few steps closer to unlocking the secrets of the early Universe.

Revealed last week at a meeting of the Canadian Astronomical Society in Kingston, Ontario, the finds easily exceed the previous record-holders and provide clues about the composition of the Universe soon after the Big Bang.