Dark matter may have begun much hotter than scientists thought
Peer-Reviewed Publication
Updates every hour. Last Updated: 13-Jan-2026 08:11 ET (13-Jan-2026 13:11 GMT/UTC)
Kyoto, Japan -- What we know of the birth of a black hole has traditionally aligned with our perception of black holes themselves: dark, mysterious, and eerily quiet, despite their mass and influence. Stellar-mass black holes are born from the final gravitational collapse of massive stars several tens of the mass of our Sun which, unlike less massive stars, do not produce bright, supernova explosions.
Or at least, this is what astronomers had previously thought, because no one had observed in real time the collapse of a massive star leading to a supernova and forming a black hole. That is, until a team of researchers at Kyoto University reported their observations of SN 2022esa.
The Kyoto team had wondered whether all massive stars -- those that are at least 30 times the mass of the Sun -- die quietly without a supernova explosion, or if in some cases they are accompanied by an energetic and bright, special type of supernova explosion. The astronomers then discovered a type Ic-CSM class supernova that appeared to be an explosion of a Wolf-Rayet star, which are so incomprehensibly massive and luminous that astronomers believe them to be the progenitors of black hole formation.
Astronomers have spotted one of the oldest ‘dead’ galaxies yet identified, and found that a growing supermassive black hole can slowly starve a galaxy rather than tear it apart.