NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has just revealed an object that breaks all known paradigms. It is MoM-BH*-1, a 'black hole star' that combines the appearance of a giant star with the energy output of a black hole. The discovery, published in the prestigious journal Nature, was made by an international team led by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the University of Hawaii.
What is a black hole star?
To understand this finding, it helps to remember that black holes are regions of space with such extreme gravity that nothing can escape them, not even light. Stars, on the other hand, are enormous spheres of gas that generate energy through nuclear fusion. But MoM-BH*-1 is neither one nor the other: it is a central black hole of about 100,000 solar masses wrapped in a dense hydrogen shell the size of our solar system. That shell gives it the appearance of a star, but its energy comes from the black hole it harbors within.
A cosmic monster in the early universe
The object is located in the constellation Cetus and formed just 660 million years after the Big Bang, when the universe was very young. Spectral analysis revealed it has a size comparable to our solar system and emits 100 billion times more energy than any known star. 'It shines with the energy typically associated with black holes, but at the same time it presents characteristics classically associated with stars,' explained Rohan Naidu, MIT researcher and currently at the University of Hawaii, who led the study.
The Balmer break: key to the discovery
One of the most surprising data points was the so-called 'Balmer break', a sharp drop in light below certain wavelengths. This phenomenon is usually found in dense, aged stars, but in MoM-BH*-1 the signal was much deeper than any previous observation. Additionally, the light lacks heavy metals, indicating a composition almost exclusively of hydrogen and helium. 'The break we observed is the deepest ever seen in any object, ruling out ordinary stars as the source,' Naidu stated.
Initially, the team thought it could be cosmic dust, a common phenomenon in the early universe. However, spectral data ruled out that possibility. 'When we see something very red in the universe, we usually assume it is surrounded by dust, like soot or ash,' explained Robert Simcoe, director of the MIT Kavli Institute and co-author of the study. But the optical signal showed a purity and intensity not associated with dust, but rather with a much more energetic mechanism.
A new type of astrophysical object
After simulating different combinations of physical characteristics, only one model managed to replicate the observation: a black hole with a mass one hundred thousand times that of the Sun, wrapped in a dense hydrogen shell the size of the solar system. This scenario explains both the extreme luminosity and the spectral uniqueness. The conclusion was that MoM-BH*-1 constitutes a new type of astrophysical object: a black hole star.
The missing piece to understand supermassive black holes?
Specialists believe this discovery could shed light on the origin of supermassive black holes found at the center of virtually all galaxies, including the Milky Way. 'For decades we have anticipated that something spectacular must be happening in the early universe. Black hole stars could be that spectacular something. They could be the nascent, protected phase that marks the beginning of the journey of almost all supermassive black holes,' Naidu suggested.
The finding also offers a clue about the mysterious 'little red dots' that James Webb has detected in numerous images of the early universe. 'These little red dots seem to be everywhere in the early universe, but they essentially disappear in the present,' Naidu noted. The current hypothesis holds that many of them could be black hole stars, though less luminous than MoM-BH*-1.
A discovery that rewrites cosmic history
What sets MoM-BH*-1 apart is the intensity with which its black hole outshines the light of its host galaxy, allowing pure black hole star light to be observed. 'What is special is that the black hole star almost completely outshines its surrounding host galaxy, so we are seeing pure black hole star light,' Naidu explained.
The study, which included participation from Wendy Sun, an MIT student, and collaborators from various international institutions, received funding from NASA, the MIT Department of Physics, and the Space Telescope Science Institute. The discovery was made possible thanks to the James Webb's ability to capture images of the universe just 660 million years after the Big Bang.
The article published in Nature was corrected on August 12 and 13, 2026, to clarify that the discovery was made after identifying a red spot in images of the early universe, not the solar system, and to update information about Rohan Naidu's professional trajectory.
Research on MoM-BH*-1 remains ongoing. The international team plans to analyze other red spots detected by James Webb to determine whether they also correspond to black hole stars or represent other unknown processes. This finding not only expands the catalog of cosmic objects but also brings humanity closer to understanding the processes that gave rise to galaxies and, ultimately, to life itself.