Researchers have identified 'J1429+5447', the most distant quasar discovered by NASA's NuSTAR X-ray Space Telescope, which exhibited intense brightness before rapidly fading.
Led by a team of astronomers from Yale University, the study utilized data from the NuSTAR and Chandra X-ray Observatory to analyze the quasar's behavior.
Scientists noted that 'J1429+5447' represents the fastest variability in brightness among known quasars from the early universe.
At a recent American Astronomical Society meeting, researchers indicated that their findings could help explain how certain celestial objects grew rapidly in the universe's infancy.
By comparing observations from NuSTAR with data from four months prior from Chandra, they found that the quasar's X-ray emission doubled in a remarkably short span of two weeks.
Dr. Lea Marcotulli, a postdoctoral astrophysics researcher and lead author of the study, stated, 'We discovered that the quasar likely has a jet directed toward Earth, probably from a supermassive black hole, dating back to the universe's first billion years.'
Co-author Meg Urry, a professor at Yale University, emphasized the extreme variability in X-ray emissions, suggesting it could be explained by a jet of particles being ejected from a supermassive black hole located a million light-years away.
The jets, moving nearly at the speed of light, cause variability to accelerate and amplify due to the effects of Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity.
Quasars, among the universe's oldest and brightest objects, are formed from 'active galactic nuclei' located at the centers of galaxies, where supermassive black holes exert significant gravitational influence.
These celestial objects can be detected across various wavelengths, including visible light, radio, infrared, ultraviolet, and X-ray and gamma-ray emissions.
Scientists observe quasars to study the 'Epoch of Reionization', a period following the Big Bang when previously neutral hydrogen atoms became ionized, allowing the first stars to illuminate the universe.
The findings were published in 'The Astrophysical Journal Letters'.