The James Webb Space Telescope has given astronomers a new view of how giant black holes at the centres of galaxies collect material and grow. The observations could help scientists understand how supermassive black holes, which can have masses millions or even billions of times greater than the Sun, became so large so quickly after the Big Bang, reported Space.com.

All large galaxies have supermassive black holes at their centres, but they do not all behave the same way. Some are quiet and consume very little gas and dust, while others actively feed on surrounding material and power bright regions called active galactic nuclei.

These feeding black holes can also send jets of matter from their poles. The jets can push gas and dust, which are needed for forming stars, out of their host galaxies. This can stop star formation and affect the growth of galaxies.

However, astronomers have found supermassive black holes in the early universe that existed less than 1 billion years after the Big Bang. This creates a mystery because the process of consuming matter and merging with other black holes should take at least 1 billion years to create such massive objects.

Source:Ndtv