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One of the most distant galaxies known GN-z11 has been observed many times by JWST in it’s first few years of observations but that data isn’t as clear cut as we hoped. There’s a debate going on (led by two camps; one in Cambridge and one in Oxford) over whether GN-z11 has a growing supermassive black hole or not. Either way it has big implications for our understanding of how galaxies and black holes evolve together in the early Universe.

Maiolino et al. (2023) - https://arxiv.org/pdf/2305.12492.pdf
Cameron et al. (2023) - https://arxiv.org/pdf/2302.10142.pdf
JWST MIRI proposal 2926: https://www.stsci.edu/jwst/phase2-pub...


00:00 Introduction
01:46 The data we have from JWST: what is a spectrum?
04:34 The argument for GN-z11 having a growing SMBH (Cambridge group)
06:28 The argument against GN-z11 having a growing SMBH (Oxford group)
10:34 How can we tell? More observations with MIRI planned
12:49 Brilliant
14:02 Bloopers

Video filmed on a Sony ⍺7 IV

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👩🏽‍💻 I'm Dr. Becky Smethurst, an astrophysicist at the University of Oxford (Christ Church). I love making videos about science with an unnatural level of enthusiasm. I like to focus on how we know things, not just what we know. And especially, the things we still don't know. If you've ever wondered about something in space and couldn't find an answer online - you can ask me! My day job is to do research into how supermassive black holes can affect the galaxies that they live in. In particular, I look at whether the energy output from the disk of material orbiting around a growing supermassive black hole can stop a galaxy from forming stars.


http://drbecky.uk.com
https://rebeccasmethurst.co.uk