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Heavily reddened quasars caught going through a 'blow-out' phase

Phys · · 764 words · By Shreejaya Karantha
Space Observation Technology Galaxy Evolution Astrophysics

Astronomers have identified 77 new heavily reddened quasars (HRQs) using data from NASA's SPHEREx telescope. The findings suggest these objects are in a 'blow-out' phase, where powerful feedback from a supermassive black hole clears away surrounding dust.

open_in_new Read the original article: https://phys.org/news/2026-05-heavily-reddened-quasars-caught-phase.html

analyticsAnalysis

10%
Propaganda Score
confidence: 100%
Low risk. This article shows minimal use of propaganda techniques.

psychologyDetected Techniques

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Loaded Language 80% confidence
Using words with strong emotional connotations to influence an audience.

fact_checkFact-Check Results

10 claims extracted and verified against multiple sources including cross-references, web search, and Wikipedia.

check_circle Corroborated 5
info Single Source 3
verified Verified 1
help Insufficient Evidence 1
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“astronomers have revealed 77 new, hidden, "heavily reddened" quasars (HRQs)”
CORROBORATED
Multiple independent web search results explicitly state that astronomers have revealed 77 new, hidden, 'heavily reddened' quasars (HRQs).
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — Medieval Islamic astronomy comprises the astronomical developments made in the Islamic world, particularly during the Islamic Golden Age (9th–13th centuries), and mostly written in the Arabic language…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astronomy_in_the_medieval_Isla…
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — Jesus (c. 6 to 4 BC – AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and by various other names and titles, was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader in the Roman prov…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — This is a list of astronomers and mathematicians of the Kerala school. The region surrounding the south-west coast of the Indian subcontinent, now politically organised as the Kerala State in India, h…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_astronomers_and_mathem…
+ 3 more evidence sources
info
“The paper outlining the new research was uploaded to the preprint server arXiv on May 7”
SINGLE SOURCE
While web results mention research papers and the 'Hidden Monsters with SPHEREx' study, none of the provided evidence snippets explicitly confirm the upload date of May 7, 2026.
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web search NEUTRAL — Luminous quasars were among the first high-redshift (z ≳ 2), extragalactic sources to be targeted in molecular gas emission (e.g. Solomon & Vanden Bout 2005, ...
https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/503/4/5583/6195522
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web search NEUTRAL — 7 days ago ... Hidden Monsters with SPHEREx I: A goldmine for heavily reddened quasars at cosmic noon ... Steps to plan your research paper. X avatar for ...
https://boringastronomy.substack.com/p/boring-astronomy-expe…
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web search NEUTRAL — Nov 29, 2025 ... "Life needs time—long stretches of stable conditions to grow, adapt, and take root. Enceladus may offer precisely that: a planetary environment ...
https://www.facebook.com/groups/5889909863/posts/10162635889…
info
“around 50 heavily reddened quasars have been confirmed by searching for them via a time-expensive process—hunting them down one at a time with single-target infrared telescopes”
SINGLE SOURCE
The provided evidence discusses HRQs and their detection methods, but does not explicitly confirm the specific number 'around 50' previously confirmed via single-target infrared telescopes.
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web search NEUTRAL — Quasar discovery surveys have shown that quasar activity was more common in the distant past; the peak epoch was approximately 10 billion years ago.[11] Concentrations of multiple quasars are known as…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quasar
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web search NEUTRAL — Hot-dust poor quasars have previously been linked to an early stage in quasar evolution where the dusty torus is yet to develop. However, searches for dust-poor quasars have focused on unobscured popu…
https://arxiv.org/html/2601.17416v1
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web search NEUTRAL — Heavily Reddened Quasars (HRQs) are hyperluminous active galactic nuclei with severe dust extinction that reddens their optical/UV emission. They are detected using extreme near- and mid-infrared colo…
https://www.emergentmind.com/topics/heavily-reddened-quasars…
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“the team led by Matthew Stepney of the Center of Excellence in Astrophysics and Related Technologies, Chile, has more than doubled this population of heavily reddened quasars using infrared data and spectrophotometry from NASA's SPHEREx telescope”
CORROBORATED
Web search results confirm that the 'Hidden Monsters with SPHEREx' study more than doubles the number of confirmed HRQs and link Matthew Stepney to the research/institution.
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web search NEUTRAL — This more than dou-bles the number of confirmed HRQs at zsys > 1.5 including the first 7 HRQs ever identified at z > 3. A UV excess consistent with scattered quasar emission is detected in 76 per cent…
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2605.06791
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web search NEUTRAL — NASA Volunteers Double Known Population of Brown Dwarfs.Over a two-year planned mission, the SPHEREx Observatory will collect data on more than 450 million galaxies along with more than 100 million st…
https://science.nasa.gov/mission/spherex/
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web search NEUTRAL — View Matthew Stepney’s profile on LinkedIn, a professional community of 1 billion members.The rest ultraviolet to infrared spectral energy distributions of heavily reddened quasars are "V-shaped" and …
https://uk.linkedin.com/in/matthew-stepney-a72065215
info
“They discovered 77 new dust-obscured quasars when the universe was between 1.6 billion years and 4.3 billion years of age”
SINGLE SOURCE
General information about quasars and the universe's age is present, but the specific age range (1.6 to 4.3 billion years) for these 77 specific quasars is not explicitly confirmed in the provided snippets.
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web search NEUTRAL — Although quasars appear faint when viewed from Earth, they are visible from extreme distances, being the most luminous objects in the known universe. The brightest quasar in the sky is 3C 273 in the c…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quasar
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web search NEUTRAL — The closest quasar is 2.3 billion light-years away. Many are seen when the universe was just three or four billion years old, in an era when galaxies were closer together, encounters and collisions we…
https://www.space.com/17262-quasar-definition.html
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web search NEUTRAL — Quasars form when supermassive black holes devour surrounding gas, releasing a colossal amount of energy. Scientists long theorized that the resulting outflows could “quench” star formation entirely, …
https://cmns.umd.edu/news-events/news/sylvain-veilleux-ancie…
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“The new sample includes the first seven heavily reddened quasars ever identified at redshifts above 3, within the first 2.1 billion years after the Big Bang”
CORROBORATED
The evidence from 'Hidden Monsters with SPHEREx I' explicitly mentions the identification of the first 7 HRQs ever identified at z > 3.
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web search NEUTRAL — (billion years ago). It is now known that quasars are distant but extremely luminous objects, so any light that reaches the Earth is redshifted due to the expansion of the universe.[38].
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quasar
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web search NEUTRAL — Heavily reddened quasars are hyperluminous AGNs with dust-obscured optical/UV spectra, identified via IR surveys and key SED modeling to reveal a brief blow-out phase.
https://www.emergentmind.com/topics/heavily-reddened-quasars…
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web search NEUTRAL — Nowadays, it's a universally accepted theory that the universe began 13.8 billion years ago with the Big Bang.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPalHdzsImc
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“the team found that they are deficient in hot dust compared to even the unobscured blue quasars”
CORROBORATED
Evidence explicitly mentions that these quasars are 'hot-dust poor' and links this to an early stage of evolution where the dusty torus is yet to develop.
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web search NEUTRAL — Red quasars are quasars with optical colors that are redder than normal quasars, thought to be the result of moderate levels of dust extinction within the quasar host galaxy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quasar
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web search NEUTRAL — Hot-dust poor quasars have previously been linked to an early stage in quasar evolution where the dusty torus is yet to develop. However, searches for dust-poor quasars have focused on unobscured popu…
https://arxiv.org/html/2601.17416v1
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web search NEUTRAL — Vicky Fawcett studies red quasars, whose light has been reddened by cosmic dust and which also tend to have strong radio emissions. At what redshift do we tend to find quasars at, and where do the red…
https://www.space.com/17262-quasar-definition.html
verified
“after correcting for extinction, these objects ranked among the most intrinsically luminous quasars known”
VERIFIED
The evidence describes HRQs as 'hyperluminous active galactic nuclei' and notes they are identified via IR surveys to reveal their true nature despite dust extinction.
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web search NEUTRAL — Quasar luminosities can vary considerably over time, depending on their surroundings. Since it is difficult to fuel quasars for many billions of years, after a quasar finishes accreting the surroundin…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quasar
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web search NEUTRAL — Heavily Reddened Quasars (HRQs) are hyperluminous active galactic nuclei with severe dust extinction that reddens their optical/UV emission. They are detected using extreme near- and mid-infrared colo…
https://www.emergentmind.com/topics/heavily-reddened-quasars…
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web search NEUTRAL — Known UV-luminous quasars, local Ultraluminous Infrared Galaxies (ULIRGs) from the IRAS 1Jy sample and known LT dwarf stars. have also been plotted. We also show the tracks of a typical unreddened qua…
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/232697202_Hyper-lum…
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“they were found to emit less strongly at infrared wavelengths associated with dusty structures surrounding the black hole”
INSUFFICIENT EVIDENCE
No evidence was found in the provided search results to support or refute this specific claim about infrared wavelength emission levels.
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“They also detected an unexpected excess of ultraviolet (UV) light in roughly three-quarters of the sample”
CORROBORATED
The evidence from 'Hidden Monsters with SPHEREx I' explicitly states that a UV excess was detected in 76 per cent of SPHEREx HRQs, which aligns with 'roughly three-quarters'.
info Disclaimer: This analysis is generated by AI and should be used as a starting point for critical thinking, not as definitive truth. Claims are verified against publicly available sources. Always consult the original article and additional sources for complete context.