Little Red Dots Are Tidal Disruption Events in Runaway-collapsing Clusters

Abstract

I hypothesize a physical explanation for the “little red dots” (LRDs) discovered by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). The first star formation in the Universe occurs in dense clusters, some of which may undergo runaway collapse and form an intermediate mass black hole. This process would appear as a very dense stellar system, with recurring tidal disruption events (TDEs) as stellar material is accreted by the black hole. Such a system would be compact, UV-emitting, and exhibit broad Hα emission. If runaway collapse is the primary mechanism for forming massive black hole seeds, this process could be fairly common and explain the large volume densities of LRDs. In order to match the predicted number density of runaway collapse clusters, the tidal disruption rate must be on the order of 10−4 per year. A top-heavy stellar initial mass function may be required to match observations without exceeding the predicted ΛCDM mass function. The TDE LRD hypothesis can be verified with follow-up JWST observations looking for TDE-like variability.