A thirty-four billion solar mass black hole in SMSS J2157–3602, the most luminous known quasar

Christopher A. Onken, Fuyan Bian, Xiaohui Fan, Feige Wang, Christian Wolf, Jinyi Yang

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

11 Scopus citations

Abstract

From near-infrared spectroscopic measurements of the Mg II emission line doublet, we estimate the black hole (BH) mass of the quasar, SMSS J215728.21–360215.1, as being (3.4 ± 0.6) × 1010 M and refine the redshift of the quasar to be z = 4.692. SMSS J2157 is the most luminous known quasar, with a 3000 Å luminosity of (4.7 ± 0.5) × 1047 erg s−1 and an estimated bolometric luminosity of 1.6 × 1048 erg s−1, yet its Eddington ratio is only ∼0.4. Thus, the high luminosity of this quasar is a consequence of its extremely large BH – one of the most massive BHs at z > 4.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)2309-2314
Number of pages6
JournalMonthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Volume496
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - 2020

Keywords

  • Galaxies: active – quasars
  • Individual
  • SMSS J215728.21–360215.1

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Astronomy and Astrophysics
  • Space and Planetary Science

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