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. 2023 Jul 25;120(30):e2305762120.
doi: 10.1073/pnas.2305762120. Epub 2023 Jul 11.

Supermassive Dark Star candidates seen by JWST

Cosmin Ilie  1 , Jillian Paulin  1 , Katherine Freese  2   3   4
Affiliations

Supermassive Dark Star candidates seen by JWST

Cosmin Ilie et al. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. .

Abstract

The first generation of stars in the universe is yet to be observed. There are two leading theories for those objects that mark the beginning of the cosmic dawn: hydrogen burning Population III stars and Dark Stars, made of hydrogen and helium but powered by dark matter heating. The latter can grow to become supermassive (M⋆ ∼ 106M⊙) and extremely bright (L ∼ 109L⊙). We show that each of the following three objects-JADES-GS-z13-0, JADES-GS-z12-0, and JADES-GS-z11-0 (at redshifts z ∈ [11, 14])-are consistent with a Supermassive Dark Star interpretation, thus identifying the first Dark Star candidates.

Keywords: cosmology; dark matter; first stars.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interest.

Figures

Fig. 1.
Fig. 1.
(Top Row: Panels A–C) Optimal fit regions in the z vs μ (magnification) parameter space for SMDS fits to JADES-GS-z11-0, JADES-GS-z12-0, and JADES-GS-z13-0 photometric data. The heatmap is color coded according to the value of the χ2 and is cutoff (grayed out) at the critical value corresponding to 95% CL. In addition to labeling the object, the title in each panel includes the mass and formation mechanism for the SMDSs model considered. (Bottom Row: Panels D–F) For each case, we plot our best fit SEDs against the photometric data of (27) in each band. Titles include values of relevant parameters and χ2. Each band is visually represented by its throughput curves, color coded and plotted at the bottom of the SED plots.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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