GA-NIFS and EIGER: A merging quasar host at z = 7 with an overmassive black hole
Marshall MA, Yue M, Eilers AC, Scholtz J, Perna M, Willott CJ, Maiolino R, Übler H, Arribas S, Bunker AJ, Charlot S, Rodríguez Del Pino B, Böker T, Carniani S, Circosta C, Cresci G, D’Eugenio F, Jones GC, Venturi G, Bordoloi R, Kashino D, Mackenzie R, Matthee JJ, Naidu R, Simcoe RA. 2025. GA-NIFS and EIGER: A merging quasar host at z = 7 with an overmassive black hole. Astronomy and Astrophysics. 702, A50.
Download
Journal Article
| Published
| English
Scopus indexed
Author
Marshall, Madeline A.;
Yue, Minghao;
Eilers, Anna Christina;
Scholtz, Jan;
Perna, Michele;
Willott, Chris J.;
Maiolino, Roberto;
Übler, Hannah;
Arribas, Santiago;
Bunker, Andrew J.;
Charlot, Stephane;
Rodríguez Del Pino, Bruno
All
All
Department
Abstract
The James Webb Space Telescope is revolutionising our ability to understand the host galaxies and local environments of high-z quasars. Here we obtain a comprehensive understanding of the host galaxy of the z = 7.08 quasar J1120+0641 by combining NIRSpec integral field spectroscopy with NIRCam photometry of the host continuum emission. Our emission-line maps reveal that this quasar host is undergoing a merger with a bright companion galaxy. The quasar host and the companion have similar dynamical masses of ∼1010 M⊙, suggesting that this is a major galaxy interaction. Through detailed quasar subtraction and SED fitting using the NIRCam data, we obtained an estimate of the host stellar mass of M* = (3.0−1.4+2.5) × 109 M⊙, with M∗ = (2.7−0.5+0.5) × 109 M⊙ for the companion galaxy. Using the Hβ Balmer line, we estimated a virial black hole mass of MBH = (1.9−1.1+2.9) × 109 M⊙. Thus, J1120+0641 has an extreme black hole–stellar mass ratio of MBH/M* = 0.63−0.31+0.54, which is ∼3 dex larger than expected by the local scaling relations between black hole and stellar mass. J1120+0641 is powered by an overmassive black hole with the highest reported black hole–stellar mass ratio in a quasar host that is currently undergoing a major merger. These new insights highlight the power of JWST for measuring and understanding these extreme first quasars.
Publishing Year
Date Published
2025-10-01
Journal Title
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Publisher
EDP Sciences
Acknowledgement
This work is based on observations made with the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope. The data were obtained from the Mikulski Archive for Space Telescopes at the Space Telescope Science Institute, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., under NASA contract NAS 5-03127 for JWST. These observations are associated with program #1263, as part of the Galaxy Assembly with NIRSpec Integral Field Spectroscopy GTO program, and program #1243, as part of the Emission-line galaxies and Intergalactic Gas in the Epoch of Reionization GTO program. We thank Ignas Juodžbalis for helping with the compilation of BH–stellar mass measurements from the literature. We thank the referee for their helpful feedback. MAM acknowledges support by the Laboratory Directed Research and Development program of Los Alamos National Laboratory under project number 20240752PRD1. The project leading to this publication has received support from ORP, that is funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 101004719 [ORP]. MP, SA and BRdP acknowledge grant PID2021-127718NB-I00 funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation/State Agency of Research (MICIN/AEI/ 10.13039/501100011033). JS, RM and FDE acknowledge support by the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), from the ERC Advanced Grant 695671 “QUENCH”. JS and FDE acknowledge the UKRI Frontier Research grant RISEandFALL. RM acknowledges funding from a research professorship from the Royal Society. HÜ acknowledges funding by the European Union (ERC APEX, 101164796). Views and opinions expressed are however those of the authors only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Research Council Executive Agency. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them. SC and GV acknowledge support from the European Union (ERC, WINGS,101040227). AJB and GCJ acknowledge funding from the “FirstGalaxies” Advanced Grant from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (Grant agreement No. 789056). DK acknowledges funding from JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number JP21K13956. This research has made use of the Astrophysics Data System, funded by NASA under Cooperative Agreement 80NSSC21M00561, QFitsView (Ott 2012), and SAOImageDS9, developed by Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. This paper made use of Python packages and software AstroPy (Astropy Collaboration 2013), jwst (Bushouse et al. 2022), Matplotlib (Hunter 2007), NumPy (van der Walt et al. 2011), Pandas (Pandas Development Team 2020), Photutils (Bradley et al. 2018), Prospector (Johnson et al. 2021), psfMC (Mechtley 2019), Regions (Bradley et al. 2022), SciPy (Virtanen et al. 2020), Seaborn (Waskom 2021), Spectral Cube (Ginsburg et al. 2019), QDeblend3D (Husemann et al. 2013, 2014), QubeSpec (https://github.com/honzascholtz/Qubespec), and WebbPSF (Perrin et al. 2015).
Volume
702
Article Number
A50
ISSN
eISSN
IST-REx-ID
Cite this
Marshall MA, Yue M, Eilers AC, et al. GA-NIFS and EIGER: A merging quasar host at z = 7 with an overmassive black hole. Astronomy and Astrophysics. 2025;702. doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202452650
Marshall, M. A., Yue, M., Eilers, A. C., Scholtz, J., Perna, M., Willott, C. J., … Simcoe, R. A. (2025). GA-NIFS and EIGER: A merging quasar host at z = 7 with an overmassive black hole. Astronomy and Astrophysics. EDP Sciences. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202452650
Marshall, Madeline A., Minghao Yue, Anna Christina Eilers, Jan Scholtz, Michele Perna, Chris J. Willott, Roberto Maiolino, et al. “GA-NIFS and EIGER: A Merging Quasar Host at z = 7 with an Overmassive Black Hole.” Astronomy and Astrophysics. EDP Sciences, 2025. https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202452650.
M. A. Marshall et al., “GA-NIFS and EIGER: A merging quasar host at z = 7 with an overmassive black hole,” Astronomy and Astrophysics, vol. 702. EDP Sciences, 2025.
Marshall MA, Yue M, Eilers AC, Scholtz J, Perna M, Willott CJ, Maiolino R, Übler H, Arribas S, Bunker AJ, Charlot S, Rodríguez Del Pino B, Böker T, Carniani S, Circosta C, Cresci G, D’Eugenio F, Jones GC, Venturi G, Bordoloi R, Kashino D, Mackenzie R, Matthee JJ, Naidu R, Simcoe RA. 2025. GA-NIFS and EIGER: A merging quasar host at z = 7 with an overmassive black hole. Astronomy and Astrophysics. 702, A50.
Marshall, Madeline A., et al. “GA-NIFS and EIGER: A Merging Quasar Host at z = 7 with an Overmassive Black Hole.” Astronomy and Astrophysics, vol. 702, A50, EDP Sciences, 2025, doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202452650.
All files available under the following license(s):
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0):
Main File(s)
File Name
Access Level
Open Access
Date Uploaded
2025-10-20
MD5 Checksum
ae625d3ebda7483bd61ecb3c497d0de9
Export
Marked PublicationsOpen Data ISTA Research Explorer
Sources
arXiv 2410.11035
Google Scholar