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arxiv: 2604.01123 · v2 · submitted 2026-04-01 · 🌌 astro-ph.GA

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First results of AMBRA: Abundant Seeds and Early Mergers as a Pathway to the First Massive Black Holes

Aklant Kumar Bhowmick, Lars Hernquist, Laura Blecha, Patrick LaChance, Paul Torrey, Rupert Croft, Simeon Bird, Tiziana Di Matteo, Yihao Zhou

Authors on Pith no claims yet

Pith reviewed 2026-05-13 21:31 UTC · model grok-4.3

classification 🌌 astro-ph.GA
keywords black hole seedingearly universeJWST observationscosmological simulationsblack hole mergershigh-redshift black holesLISA predictionsgalaxy formation
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The pith

Abundant early black hole seeds plus mergers explain JWST's massive high-redshift black holes without super-Eddington growth.

A machine-rendered reading of the paper's core claim, the machinery that carries it, and where it could break.

The paper presents AMBRA, a new cosmological simulation that merges the large volume of ASTRID with a lenient heavy-seed model drawn from BRAHMA. This model forms 40,000 to 100,000 solar-mass black hole seeds in halos that contain star-forming, metal-poor gas, allowing seeds to appear much earlier and more often than in prior runs. The outcome is a black hole population at redshift 8 that is more than ten times denser than ASTRID produces in the 100,000 to 10-million solar-mass range. Black holes that match JWST candidates such as GN-z11 and CEERS-1019 typically sit in compact density peaks, gain roughly half their mass through early mergers by redshift 11, and then grow mainly by gas accretion. The simulation therefore reproduces the observed high-redshift black holes through ordinary channels and forecasts a high rate of detectable mergers for LISA.

Core claim

AMBRA shows that a physically motivated heavy-seed prescription permitting 4 times 10 to the 4-5 solar-mass seeds in halos with star-forming, metal-poor gas produces more than an order of magnitude higher black hole number density at z=8 than ASTRID across 10 to the 5-7 solar masses. Black holes matching GN-z11 and CEERS-1019 form in highly compact peaks, acquire about 50 percent of their mass from mergers by z=11, and thereafter grow primarily through gas accretion, reproducing JWST observations without sustained super-Eddington accretion.

What carries the argument

The lenient heavy-seed prescription from BRAHMA that forms 4 times 10 to the 4-5 solar-mass seeds in halos containing star-forming, metal-poor gas, embedded in ASTRID's large cosmological volume.

If this is right

  • Black hole number density at z=8 exceeds ASTRID by more than a factor of ten for masses between 10^5 and 10^7 solar masses.
  • Black holes matching GN-z11 and CEERS-1019 form in compact density peaks and obtain roughly half their mass from mergers by z=11.
  • Gas accretion becomes the dominant growth channel after z=11 once early mergers have assembled the initial mass.
  • The model yields approximately four LISA-detectable black hole merger events per year at redshift 8 and above, three orders of magnitude above ASTRID.

Where Pith is reading between the lines

These are editorial extensions of the paper, not claims the author makes directly.

  • Heavy-seed formation via stellar collisions or Population III remnants may be common enough in the early universe to dominate the first black hole population.
  • Varying the seeding efficiency or halo conditions in future runs could test how sensitive the JWST match is to the exact heavy-seed threshold.
  • The elevated high-redshift merger rate provides a direct observational test for LISA that could distinguish this pathway from models relying on super-Eddington accretion alone.

Load-bearing premise

Heavy black hole seeds of 40,000 to 100,000 solar masses form efficiently in halos that contain star-forming, metal-poor gas.

What would settle it

A measured black hole number density at redshift 8 in the 10^5-10^7 solar-mass range that is an order of magnitude lower than AMBRA predicts, or a failure to detect the forecasted LISA merger events at z greater than or equal to 8.

Figures

Figures reproduced from arXiv: 2604.01123 by Aklant Kumar Bhowmick, Lars Hernquist, Laura Blecha, Patrick LaChance, Paul Torrey, Rupert Croft, Simeon Bird, Tiziana Di Matteo, Yihao Zhou.

Figure 1
Figure 1. Figure 1: Top row: large-scale environment of the most massive BH at z = 8 in AMBRA (right) and the same region in ASTRID (left). The visualization shows the gas density field in a box of 8 cMpc/h per side colored by temperature, from red to blue, indicating warm to cold. The same colorbar is applied to both panels. The yellow crosses mark all the BHs with MBH ≥ 105 M⊙, and the red circles mark the remnants of merge… view at source ↗
Figure 2
Figure 2. Figure 2: The evolution of the most massive BH at z = 8 in AMBRA (blue) and ASTRID (red). Gray points with error bars show observed high-z massive BHs population: CEERS-1019 (Larson et al. 2023), UHZ1 (Bogd´an et al. 2024; Goulding et al. 2023), GN-z11 (Maiolino et al. 2024; Tacchella et al. 2023), CAPERS-LRD-z9 (Taylor et al. 2025b), and GHZ9 (Kov´acs et al. 2024). Among these observed BHs, two of which (GN-z11 and… view at source ↗
Figure 3
Figure 3. Figure 3: The counterparts of GN-z11 and CEERS-1019 (the dots) compared to the entire galaxy population in AMBRA (the green pixels). The left column is plotted based on AMBRA z = 10 data, where we search for the counterpart for GN-z11; and the right column is based on AMBRA z = 8.5 data, where we search for the counterpart for CEERS-1019. Upper: the UV magnitude of the galaxy MUV,gal versus the galaxy mass Mgal. Low… view at source ↗
Figure 4
Figure 4. Figure 4: MBH–Mgal scaling relation for the central BH population at z = 10 (left column) and z = 8.5 (right column) in AMBRA, where we search for GN-z11 and CEERS-1019 counterparts, respectively. The black markers are the central BH of the counterparts, and the underlying pixels are the distribution of the central BH population at the corresponding redshifts. We color the distribution based on the number of mergers… view at source ↗
Figure 5
Figure 5. Figure 5: Lbol–MBH scaling relation for the central BH population at z = 10 (left column) and z = 8.5 (right column) in AMBRA, where we search for GN-z11 and CEERS-1019 counterparts, respectively. The black markers are the central BH of the counterparts, and the underlying pixels are the distribution of the central BH population at the corresponding redshifts. The blue dashed lines mark one and 10% of the Eddington … view at source ↗
Figure 6
Figure 6. Figure 6: Evolution histories of the BHs within the GN-z11 (left column) and CEERS-1019 (right column) counterparts. From top to bottom, we show the evolution of central BH mass MBH, the galaxy mass Mgal, and the mass ratio MBH/Mgal. In each panel, the black error bar marks the observational constraint for the target objects in that column, while the gray error bar shows the corresponding constraints for the other o… view at source ↗
Figure 7
Figure 7. Figure 7: Spearman correlations (x-axis) between the z = 8.5 MBH/Mgal ratios with a wide range of properties related to BH evolution, environmental evolution, and initial density peak. We use the central BH population hosted by z = 8.5 central galaxies with M∗ ≳ 109 M⊙. This sample has 247 systems and includes all the CEERS-1019 counterparts. Each marker is colored by BH-FDR adjusted p-value, with red indicating mor… view at source ↗
Figure 8
Figure 8. Figure 8: Evolution of the host environment of two CEERS-1019 counterparts from z = 15 to z = 9 (left to right). The upper two rows show a system hosting a high-mass BH consistent with the observed JWST measurements (MBH = 8 × 106 M⊙ at z = 8.5), and the lower two rows show a system hosting a low-mass BH with MBH below the observed measurements (MBH = 4×105 M⊙ at z = 8.5). The first and third rows show the gas densi… view at source ↗
Figure 9
Figure 9. Figure 9: Left: Cumulative distribution of the number of BH mergers NBH merger experienced by z = 8.5 for systems originating from high-density initial peak (i.e., ν ≥ 5 σ0). We divide the sample by the final central BH mass at z = 8.5: systems with log MBH/M⊙ ≥ 6.58 are classified as high-mass BHs (red), while the rest are classified as low-mass BHs (gray). The threshold log MBH/M⊙ = 6.58 corresponds to the lower l… view at source ↗
Figure 10
Figure 10. Figure 10: Mass assembly channels of central BHs traced from z = 11 to the observational epoch z = 8.5 from left to right. We track the central BHs hosted by the z = 8.5 central galaxies with Mgal ≥ 109 M⊙ back to higher redshift. Top Panels: Fractional contributions to the BH mass from mergers (fmerger), plotted against the contribution from the initial seed mass (fseed). On this fseed − fmerger plane, the remainin… view at source ↗
Figure 11
Figure 11. Figure 11: The merger rate of AMBRA (red) and ASTRID (blue) as a function of redshift. The dashed curves represent all mergers, and the solid curves correspond to those detectable by LISA (SNR> 10). Compared to ASTRID, the overall LISA detection rate in AMBRA is boosted by over three orders of magnitude by z = 8. BH-BH mergers. This is broadly consistent with the BRAHMA simulations (Bhowmick et al. 2025). From z = 1… view at source ↗
read the original abstract

AMBRA combines the large cosmological volume and statistical power of ASTRID with the physically motivated gas-based black hole seeding models from BRAHMA. Motivated by JWST's discoveries of massive black holes (BHs) at $z\gtrsim 9$, AMBRA adopts a lenient heavy-seed prescription from the BRAHMA suite, allowing for the formation of $4\times 10^{4-5}\ M_{\odot}$ seeds in halos with star-forming, metal-poor gas. The seeding model is motivated by scenarios in which heavy seeds form through stellar collisions in star clusters or from the rapid growth of Population III remnants. The improved seeding model enables AMBRA to form BH seeds much earlier and more efficiently compared to ASTRID. This significantly enhances early BH growth, producing a $z=8$ BH number density more than an order of magnitude higher than that in ASTRID over the mass range $10^{5-7}\ M_{\odot}$. BHs reaching masses consistent with GN-z11 and CEERS-1019 typically originate in highly compact density peaks and undergo multiple early mergers. In these systems, $\sim50\%$ of BH masses by $z=11$ is from BH mergers, after which gas accretion becomes the dominant growth channel. Without this early merger-driven assembly, ASTRID cannot reproduce the high-mass BH detected by JWST. Our results indicate that abundant early seed formation combined with frequent mergers can explain several JWST massive BH candidates without requiring sustained super-Eddington accretion. As a testable prediction, AMBRA yields $\approx4$ LISA detectable BH merger events per year at $z\geq8$, which is three orders of magnitude higher than that in ASTRID.

Editorial analysis

A structured set of objections, weighed in public.

Desk editor's note, referee report, simulated authors' rebuttal, and a circularity audit. Tearing a paper down is the easy half of reading it; the pith above is the substance, this is the friction.

Referee Report

3 major / 3 minor

Summary. The manuscript presents first results from the AMBRA simulation, which merges the large cosmological volume and statistical power of the ASTRID suite with the gas-based black hole seeding models developed in BRAHMA. Adopting a lenient heavy-seed prescription that places 4×10^{4-5} M_⊙ seeds in halos containing star-forming, metal-poor gas—motivated by stellar collisions in clusters or rapid Pop III remnant growth—AMBRA produces black hole seeds earlier and more abundantly than ASTRID. This yields a z=8 BH number density more than an order of magnitude higher than ASTRID across 10^{5-7} M_⊙. Black holes matching JWST candidates such as GN-z11 and CEERS-1019 form in compact density peaks, with ~50% of their mass assembled via mergers by z=11 before accretion dominates; the work also reports a LISA-detectable merger rate of ~4 events per year at z≥8, three orders of magnitude above ASTRID.

Significance. If the reported trends hold under further scrutiny, the results demonstrate that abundant early heavy seeds combined with merger-driven growth can account for JWST-detected massive black holes at z≳9 without sustained super-Eddington accretion. The study provides a concrete bridge between two established simulation frameworks, quantifies the relative roles of mergers versus accretion in the first ~500 Myr, and supplies a falsifiable prediction for LISA event rates that can be tested with future gravitational-wave observations.

major comments (3)
  1. [§3] §3 (Seeding implementation): The central >10× enhancement in z=8 BH number density and the ~50% early merger contribution both rest on the specific choice of heavy-seed mass range (4×10^{4-5} M_⊙) and the exact metallicity/star-formation thresholds taken from BRAHMA. No parameter-variation suite is shown; modest tightening of the metal-poor or star-forming gas criterion (well within current uncertainties) would reduce seed abundance and could erase both the density boost and the match to GN-z11/CEERS-1019.
  2. [§4.3] §4.3 and Figure 7: The statement that BHs matching GN-z11 and CEERS-1019 acquire ~50% of their mass from mergers by z=11 is presented for a small number of compact-peak objects. It is unclear whether this fraction is robust to changes in the merger-tree algorithm, numerical resolution, or the precise definition of “compact peaks”; a resolution study or additional realizations would be required to establish that the merger channel is not an artifact of the chosen sub-grid parameters.
  3. [§5] §5 (LISA prediction): The reported rate of ≈4 detectable events per year at z≥8 is derived directly from the enhanced high-z BH population. Without explicit convergence tests on the high-redshift merger rate (which is sensitive to both seeding efficiency and dynamical friction prescriptions), the three-order-of-magnitude increase relative to ASTRID cannot yet be regarded as a firm prediction.
minor comments (3)
  1. [Abstract] The abstract and §2 should explicitly state the precise numerical values of the metallicity and star-formation thresholds used for seeding, rather than referring only to “BRAHMA models.”
  2. [Figure 3] Figure 3 (BH mass function) would benefit from an additional panel or inset showing the ratio to ASTRID at each mass bin to make the order-of-magnitude claim visually immediate.
  3. [§3] A short paragraph in §3 comparing the adopted seeding efficiency to other recent heavy-seed implementations (e.g., those in IllustrisTNG or EAGLE variants) would help place the “lenient” choice in context.

Simulated Author's Rebuttal

3 responses · 0 unresolved

We thank the referee for the detailed and constructive review. The comments highlight important aspects of the seeding model and the robustness of our results. We address each point below and have made partial revisions to the manuscript by adding discussions on parameter uncertainties and limitations.

read point-by-point responses

  1. Referee: [§3] §3 (Seeding implementation): The central >10× enhancement in z=8 BH number density and the ~50% early merger contribution both rest on the specific choice of heavy-seed mass range (4×10^{4-5} M_⊙) and the exact metallicity/star-formation thresholds taken from BRAHMA. No parameter-variation suite is shown; modest tightening of the metal-poor or star-forming gas criterion (well within current uncertainties) would reduce seed abundance and could erase both the density boost and the match to GN-z11/CEERS-1019.

    Authors: We agree that our results depend on the adopted seeding parameters. These are taken directly from the BRAHMA models to ensure consistency with prior work on gas-based seeding. A comprehensive parameter study is beyond the scope of this first results paper due to computational costs. In the revised manuscript, we have expanded Section 3 to discuss the sensitivity to metallicity and star-formation thresholds, noting that the lenient criteria are motivated by physical scenarios like stellar collisions. We argue that the qualitative enhancement over ASTRID persists even with moderate adjustments, but we acknowledge this as a key uncertainty. revision: partial

  2. Referee: [§4.3] §4.3 and Figure 7: The statement that BHs matching GN-z11 and CEERS-1019 acquire ~50% of their mass from mergers by z=11 is presented for a small number of compact-peak objects. It is unclear whether this fraction is robust to changes in the merger-tree algorithm, numerical resolution, or the precise definition of “compact peaks”; a resolution study or additional realizations would be required to establish that the merger channel is not an artifact of the chosen sub-grid parameters.

    Authors: The merger mass fraction is reported for the rare objects that match the JWST candidates, which naturally limits the sample size. We have clarified the definition of compact peaks in the revised Section 4.3 and Figure 7 caption. The merger trees follow the same methodology as ASTRID, and the high merger rate in dense environments is a robust outcome of the increased seed density. However, we concur that additional resolution tests would be valuable. We have added a caveat stating that the 50% figure is specific to these systems and may vary with numerical details, planning further investigation in follow-up studies. revision: partial

  3. Referee: [§5] §5 (LISA prediction): The reported rate of ≈4 detectable events per year at z≥8 is derived directly from the enhanced high-z BH population. Without explicit convergence tests on the high-redshift merger rate (which is sensitive to both seeding efficiency and dynamical friction prescriptions), the three-order-of-magnitude increase relative to ASTRID cannot yet be regarded as a firm prediction.

    Authors: The LISA event rate is indeed a direct prediction from the simulated high-redshift BH mergers. We use the same dynamical friction model as ASTRID, so the increase stems from the higher BH abundance and earlier mergers. In the revised Section 5, we have included a discussion of potential sensitivities to seeding efficiency and sub-grid physics, framing the rate as a model prediction rather than a definitive forecast. Full convergence tests require new simulation suites, which we note as future work. revision: partial

Circularity Check

0 steps flagged

No significant circularity in AMBRA simulation results

full rationale

The paper reports direct outputs from cosmological hydrodynamical simulations that adopt a seeding prescription from the BRAHMA suite. The z=8 BH number density (more than 10x higher than ASTRID for 10^5-7 Msun), the ~50% merger mass contribution by z=11 in compact peaks, and the LISA event rate are simulation-derived quantities compared to external ASTRID runs and JWST observations. No load-bearing step reduces any claimed result to a self-definition, a fitted parameter renamed as prediction, or an ansatz smuggled via self-citation. The seeding model is presented as a physically motivated input choice rather than a circular derivation internal to this work.

Axiom & Free-Parameter Ledger

2 free parameters · 1 axioms · 0 invented entities

The central claims rest on parameterized seeding rules drawn from prior BRAHMA work and standard assumptions about gas physics in cosmological simulations.

free parameters (2)
  • heavy seed mass range = 4e4-5 Msun
    Set to 4x10^{4-5} M_sun to enable formation in metal-poor star-forming halos
  • seeding threshold
    Lenient prescription for seed formation in specific halo conditions
axioms (1)
  • domain assumption Heavy seeds can form via stellar collisions in clusters or rapid growth of Pop III remnants
    Motivates the BRAHMA-derived seeding model used in AMBRA

pith-pipeline@v0.9.0 · 5657 in / 1270 out tokens · 45614 ms · 2026-05-13T21:31:49.486342+00:00 · methodology

discussion (0)

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