Lester Sandles

Abstract Multiple theories have been proposed to describe the formation of black hole seeds in the early Universe and to explain the emergence of very massive black holes observed in the first billion years after Big Bang1–3. Models consider different seeding and accretion scenarios4–7, which require the detection and characterisation of black holes in the first few hundred million years after Big Bang to be validated.

Author notes These authors contributed equally: Irene Shivaei, Renske Smit Authors and Affiliations Kavli Institute for Cosmology, University of Cambridge, Madingley Road, Cambridge, UK Joris Witstok, Roberto Maiolino, Mirko Curti, Francesco D’Eugenio, Tobias J. Looser, William M. Baker, Lester Sandles, Jan Scholtz & Sandro Tacchella Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge, 19 JJ Thomson Avenue, Cambridge, UK Joris Witstok, Roberto Maiolino, Mirko Curti, Francesco D’Eugenio, Tobias J.

Abstract Finding and characterizing the first galaxies that illuminated the early universe at cosmic dawn is pivotal to understand the physical conditions and the processes that led to the formation of the first stars. In the first few months of operations, imaging from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has been used to identify tens of candidates of galaxies at redshift (z) greater than 10, less than 450 million years after the Big Bang.