The Physics department colloquia are usually on Friday afternoons at 3:30 pm in Lapham Hall Room 160. Coffee and cookies are served at 3:15 pm in the same room. Anyone is welcome.

The Lifecycle of Supermassive Black Holes
Dr. Jenny Greene Assistant Professor, Dept. of Astrophysical Sciences, Princeton University

I will discuss the full life cycle of supermassive black holes (BHs). I will start with the formation of BH seeds at high redshift, and the imprint seed formation may leave on the distribution of low-mass BHs in dwarf galaxies today. From there I will discuss observational constraints on the merging of binary BHs. The other way BHs grow is through accretion, and I’ll investigate the putative impact of BH growth on the surrounding host galaxy, with a focus on luminous obscured quasars.

I’ll end with the old age of the most massive BHs known in the universe today.