A crystal site enables a nuclear clock; a spectrum exposes a hidden black hole
Thorium-229 found an even electric field at only one of four sites in calcium fluoride. JWST's MoM-BH*-1 spectrum, meanwhile, points to a black hole wrapped in dense gas.
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One of four crystal sites protects the clock
Thorsten Schumm and colleagues at the Vienna University of Technology mapped four distinct sites that thorium-229 atoms can occupy inside calcium fluoride. Three sites return light at several wavelengths, signalling an uneven electric field around them; only the fourth responds at one wavelength. Published in Science, the result ties the even field needed for a nuclear clock to a particular place in the crystal. Schumm says nucleus-based clocks could be up to 10 times more sensitive than today's atomic clocks; the team's present priority is shrinking the apparatus from laboratory size to shoebox size.[1]
JWST's red dot reaches back to 660 million years
JWST's MoM survey detected an unusually bright red dot whose light comes from 660 million years after the Big Bang. Named MoM-BH*-1, the source is the research team's strongest black-hole-star candidate so far. The proposed structure places a large black hole inside dense gas, with the central object heating the surrounding material to produce star-like brightness. The Nature paper reported by Live Science says this interpretation could help explain the origin of the distant, puzzling sources known as little red dots.[2]
The identity of little red dots remains open
A black-hole star remains a proposed, unsettled class of object; applying that name to MoM-BH*-1 depends on explaining the measured light with a particular physical model. Live Science stresses that the data are unusual while rival explanations remain viable. The proposed object rests on a star and a black hole forming an extremely bright equilibrium within one system. This interpretation offers one possible origin for little red dots; for now, MoM-BH*-1 represents one possible internal structure for the early universe's bright red sources.[2]
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