Hunting for Massive Black Holes in Dwarf Galaxies

Understand

Despite traditional thinking, an appreciable population of massive black holes may be lurking in dwarf galaxies.

• Prior to the last decade, nearly all massive black holes were found in the nuclei of giant galaxies and the existence of massive black holes in dwarf galaxies was highly controversial.
• The field has now been transformed with a growing community of researchers working on a variety of observational studies and theoretical models of dwarf galaxies hosting massive black holes.
• Work in this area is not only important for a holistic understanding of dwarf galaxy evolution and feedback, but it may just tell us how the first "seeds" of massive black holes formed in the early Universe.