Topic: massive black holes

Future extreme-mass-ratio inspiral detections could identify how compact objects reach massive black holes. This talk compares expected eccentricities, inclinations and component masses for gas-free and gas-assisted formation. It examines how population measurements might separate channels and reveal properties of active-galaxy disks, including lifetimes and turbulence, as well as accretion behaviour and stellar black-hole populations in nuclear clusters.

This seminar asks how massive black holes grew so quickly in the early Universe. It places the Milky Way's central black hole in the broader population of galactic nuclei, then examines the first billion years of growth. Exceptionally rapid early development challenges current explanations and shapes later cosmic evolution.