{"date_updated":"2026-09-22T06:14:37Z","das_tickbox":"1","acknowledgement":"The authors thank the anonymous referee for constructive comments, which helped improve the manuscript. The authors also thank Xiaohui Fan, Xiaojing Lin, Camilla Pacifici, Marianna Annunziatella, Claudia Scarlata, Luis C. Ho, and Pablo G. Pérez-González for valuable discussions.\r\n\r\nThis work is based on observations made with the NASA/ESA/CSA JWST. The data were obtained from the Mikulski Archive for Space Telescopes (MAST) 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 JWST programs GTO #1181, GTO #1211, GO #1895, GO #3577, and GO #6434 (F. Sun et al. 2025).\r\n\r\nSome of the data products presented herein were retrieved from the Dawn JWST Archive (DJA). DJA is an initiative of the Cosmic Dawn Center (DAWN), which is funded by the Danish National Research Foundation under grant DNRF140.\r\n\r\nThis research has made use of data obtained from the Chandra Data Archive provided by the Chandra X-ray Center (CXC).\r\n\r\nThe authors acknowledge the FRESCO team led by PI P. Oesch for developing their observing program with a zero-exclusive-access period. Processing for the JADES NIRCam data release was performed on the lux cluster at the University of California, Santa Cruz, funded by NSF MRI grant AST 1828315. Also based on observations made with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope obtained from the Space Telescope Science Institute, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., under NASA contract NAS 526555. The data (G. Illingworth 2015; P. Oesch & D. Magee 2023; M. Rieke et al. 2023a; F. Sun & E. Egami 2025) presented in this article were obtained from MAST at the Space Telescope Science Institute.\r\n\r\nThe authors acknowledge use of the lux supercomputer at UC Santa Cruz, funded by NSF MRI grant AST 1828315.\r\n\r\nThe work of G.H.R. and P.R. was also supported by grant 80NSSC18K0555, from NASA Goddard Space Flight Center to the University of Arizona.\r\n\r\nA.J.B. acknowledges funding from the “FirstGalaxies” Advanced grant from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (grant agreement No. 789056)\r\n\r\nB.E.R. acknowledges support from the NIRCam Science Team contract to the University of Arizona, NAS5-02015, and JWST Program 3215.\r\n\r\nThe research of C.C.W. is supported by NOIRLab, which is managed by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) under a cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation.\r\n\r\nS.C. acknowledges support by the European Union’s HE ERC Starting grant No. 101040227 - WINGS.\r\n\r\nY.Z., Z.J., B.D.J., C.N.A.W., and P.R. gratefully acknowledge the JWST/NIRCam contract to the University of Arizona NAS5-02015.\r\n\r\nS.A. acknowledges support from the JWST Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) Science Team Lead, grant 80NSSC18K0555, from NASA Goddard Space Flight Center to the University of Arizona.\r\n\r\nR.M., F.D.E. acknowledge support by the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), by the ERC through Advanced grant 695671 “QUENCH,” and by the UKRI Frontier Research grant RISEandFALL. R.M. also acknowledges funding from a research professorship from the Royal Society.\r\n\r\nL.B. acknowledges financial support from the Inter-University Institute for Data Intensive Astronomy (IDIA), a partnership of the University of Cape Town, the University of Pretoria and the University of the Western Cape, and from the South African Department of Science and Innovation’s National Research Foundation under the ISARP RADIOMAP+ Joint Research Scheme (DSI-NRF grant No. 150551) and the CPRR HIPPO Project (DSI-NRF grant No. SRUG22031677). C.J.E.G. acknowledges the financial assistance of the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory (SARAO) (www.sarao.ac.za).","volume":1006,"publisher":"IOP Publishing","publication_identifier":{"eissn":["1538-4357"],"issn":["0004-637X"]},"ddc":["520"],"DOAJ_listed":"1","type":"journal_article","tmp":{"legal_code_url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","image":"/images/cc_by.png","short":"CC BY (4.0)","name":"Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0)"},"arxiv":1,"external_id":{"arxiv":["2507.17738"]},"publication_status":"published","OA_type":"gold","researchdata_availability":"no","publication":"The Astrophysical Journal","oa_version":"Published Version","date_created":"2026-09-17T11:05:32Z","citation":{"chicago":"Rinaldi, Pierluigi, George H. Rieke, Zihao Wu, Carys J. E. Gilbert, Fabio Pacucci, Luigi Barchiesi, Stacey Alberts, et al. “Beyond the Dot: An LRD-like Nucleus at the Heart of an IR-Bright Galaxy and Its Implications for High-Redshift LRDs.” <i>The Astrophysical Journal</i>. IOP Publishing, 2026. <a href=\"https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae80cd\">https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae80cd</a>.","ama":"Rinaldi P, Rieke GH, Wu Z, et al. Beyond the dot: An LRD-like nucleus at the heart of an IR-bright galaxy and its implications for high-redshift LRDs. <i>The Astrophysical Journal</i>. 2026;1006(2). doi:<a href=\"https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae80cd\">10.3847/1538-4357/ae80cd</a>","ieee":"P. Rinaldi <i>et al.</i>, “Beyond the dot: An LRD-like nucleus at the heart of an IR-bright galaxy and its implications for high-redshift LRDs,” <i>The Astrophysical Journal</i>, vol. 1006, no. 2. IOP Publishing, 2026.","apa":"Rinaldi, P., Rieke, G. H., Wu, Z., Gilbert, C. J. E., Pacucci, F., Barchiesi, L., … Zhu, Y. (2026). Beyond the dot: An LRD-like nucleus at the heart of an IR-bright galaxy and its implications for high-redshift LRDs. <i>The Astrophysical Journal</i>. IOP Publishing. <a href=\"https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae80cd\">https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae80cd</a>","mla":"Rinaldi, Pierluigi, et al. “Beyond the Dot: An LRD-like Nucleus at the Heart of an IR-Bright Galaxy and Its Implications for High-Redshift LRDs.” <i>The Astrophysical Journal</i>, vol. 1006, no. 2, 205, IOP Publishing, 2026, doi:<a href=\"https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae80cd\">10.3847/1538-4357/ae80cd</a>.","ista":"Rinaldi P, Rieke GH, Wu Z, Gilbert CJE, Pacucci F, Barchiesi L, Alberts S, Carniani S, Bunker AJ, Bhatawdekar R, D’Eugenio F, Ji Z, Johnson BD, Hainline K, Kokorev V, Kumari N, Iani E, Lyu J, Maiolino R, Parlanti E, Robertson BE, Sun Y, Vignali C, Williams CC, Willmer CNA, Zhu Y. 2026. Beyond the dot: An LRD-like nucleus at the heart of an IR-bright galaxy and its implications for high-redshift LRDs. The Astrophysical Journal. 1006(2), 205.","short":"P. Rinaldi, G.H. Rieke, Z. Wu, C.J.E. Gilbert, F. Pacucci, L. Barchiesi, S. Alberts, S. Carniani, A.J. Bunker, R. Bhatawdekar, F. D’Eugenio, Z. Ji, B.D. Johnson, K. Hainline, V. Kokorev, N. Kumari, E. Iani, J. Lyu, R. Maiolino, E. Parlanti, B.E. Robertson, Y. Sun, C. Vignali, C.C. Williams, C.N.A. Willmer, Y. Zhu, The Astrophysical Journal 1006 (2026)."},"article_number":"205","language":[{"iso":"eng"}],"PlanS_conform":"1","scopus_import":"1","article_type":"original","status":"public","_id":"22950","abstract":[{"lang":"eng","text":"Little red dots (LRDs) are compact, red sources discovered by JWST at high redshift (z ≳ 4), marked by distinctive “V-shaped” spectral energy distributions (SEDs) and often interpreted as rapidly accreting active galactic nuclei (AGNs). Their true nature remains unclear though, and their evolutionary connection to their lower-redshift counterparts is still poorly constrained. Thus, we present WISEA J123635.56+621424.2 (here dubbed the Saguaro), a z = 2.0145 galaxy in GOODS-North, as a possible analog of high-redshift LRDs and a potential missing link in their evolutionary path toward lower-redshift systems. It features a compact LRD-like nucleus surrounded by a face-on spiral host. Its connections to LRDs include the following: (1) its nuclear spectrum shows a clear “V-shaped” SED, and (2) when redshifted to z = 7, surface brightness dimming makes the host undetectable, thus mimicking an LRD. This suggests that high-redshift LRDs may be embedded in extended hosts. To test this, we stack rest-frame UV images of 99 photometrically selected LRDs, revealing faint, diffuse emission. Stacking in redshift bins reveals mild radial growth, consistent with the expected galaxy size evolution. A simple analytic model confirms that surface brightness dimming alone can explain their compact appearance. Lastly, we show that the Saguaro is not unique by describing similar objects from the literature at z ≲ 3.5. Taken together, our results support a scenario in which LRDs may not be a distinct population, but could be the visible nuclei of galaxies undergoing a short-lived, (perhaps) AGN-dominated evolutionary phase, with their compact, red appearance driven largely by observational biases."}],"dataavailabilitystatement":"Facilities: CXO - Chandra X-ray Observatory satellite, HST - Hubble Space Telescope satellite, JWST - James Webb Space Telescope.\r\n\r\nSoftware: Astropy (Astropy Collaboration et al. 2022), Bagpipes (A. C. Carnall et al. 2019), MSAEXP (G. Brammer 2023)NumPy (C. R. Harris et al. 2020), pandas (T. p. d team 2024)Photutils (L. Bradley et al. 2016), TOPCAT (M. Taylor 2022), CIAO (A. Fruscione et al. 2006), XSpec (K. Arnaud et al. 1999), STPSF (M. D. Perrin et al. 2014).","title":"Beyond the dot: An LRD-like nucleus at the heart of an IR-bright galaxy and its implications for high-redshift LRDs","doi":"10.3847/1538-4357/ae80cd","department":[{"_id":"JoMa"}],"quality_controlled":"1","file":[{"date_updated":"2026-09-22T06:13:50Z","access_level":"open_access","file_size":6154775,"checksum":"ef77723c7b0fa7f82085eba8caec0cf3","file_id":"22979","creator":"dernst","content_type":"application/pdf","relation":"main_file","date_created":"2026-09-22T06:13:50Z","success":1,"file_name":"2026_AstrophysicalJour_Rinaldi.pdf"}],"date_published":"2026-07-29T00:00:00Z","oa":1,"has_accepted_license":"1","year":"2026","intvolume":"      1006","month":"07","issue":"2","user_id":"2DF688A6-F248-11E8-B48F-1D18A9856A87","author":[{"last_name":"Rinaldi","full_name":"Rinaldi, Pierluigi","first_name":"Pierluigi"},{"first_name":"George H.","last_name":"Rieke","full_name":"Rieke, George H."},{"last_name":"Wu","full_name":"Wu, Zihao","first_name":"Zihao"},{"last_name":"Gilbert","full_name":"Gilbert, Carys J. E.","first_name":"Carys J. E."},{"last_name":"Pacucci","full_name":"Pacucci, Fabio","first_name":"Fabio"},{"first_name":"Luigi","last_name":"Barchiesi","full_name":"Barchiesi, Luigi"},{"last_name":"Alberts","full_name":"Alberts, Stacey","first_name":"Stacey"},{"first_name":"Stefano","full_name":"Carniani, Stefano","last_name":"Carniani"},{"last_name":"Bunker","full_name":"Bunker, Andrew J.","first_name":"Andrew J."},{"last_name":"Bhatawdekar","full_name":"Bhatawdekar, Rachana","first_name":"Rachana"},{"full_name":"D’Eugenio, Francesco","last_name":"D’Eugenio","first_name":"Francesco"},{"first_name":"Zhiyuan","full_name":"Ji, Zhiyuan","last_name":"Ji"},{"last_name":"Johnson","full_name":"Johnson, Benjamin D.","first_name":"Benjamin D."},{"first_name":"Kevin","last_name":"Hainline","full_name":"Hainline, Kevin"},{"full_name":"Kokorev, Vasily","last_name":"Kokorev","first_name":"Vasily"},{"last_name":"Kumari","full_name":"Kumari, Nimisha","first_name":"Nimisha"},{"orcid":"0000-0001-8386-3546","first_name":"Edoardo","full_name":"Iani, Edoardo","last_name":"Iani","id":"4053390a-6b68-11ef-9828-a3b8adef8d0a"},{"first_name":"Jianwei","full_name":"Lyu, Jianwei","last_name":"Lyu"},{"first_name":"Roberto","last_name":"Maiolino","full_name":"Maiolino, Roberto"},{"last_name":"Parlanti","full_name":"Parlanti, Eleonora","first_name":"Eleonora"},{"first_name":"Brant E.","full_name":"Robertson, Brant E.","last_name":"Robertson"},{"full_name":"Sun, Yang","last_name":"Sun","first_name":"Yang"},{"first_name":"Cristian","last_name":"Vignali","full_name":"Vignali, Cristian"},{"first_name":"Christina C.","full_name":"Williams, Christina C.","last_name":"Williams"},{"last_name":"Willmer","full_name":"Willmer, Christopher N. A.","first_name":"Christopher N. A."},{"last_name":"Zhu","full_name":"Zhu, Yongda","first_name":"Yongda"}],"day":"29","fulldoi":"https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae80cd","OA_place":"publisher","file_date_updated":"2026-09-22T06:13:50Z","supplementarymaterial":"yes","article_processing_charge":"Yes"}