An illustration of Nāpōwawāʻenakaulua the oldest and tightest pair of quasars ever discovered (Image credit: International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/P. Marenfeld/M. Zamani)

Using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), astronomers have discovered the oldest pair of supermassive black hole-powered quasars ever seen. There's just one problem: they shouldn't exist!

The compact quasar pair, spotted with the aid of the Gemini North telescope, has been designated J1602+4228AB and nicknamed Nāpōwawāʻenakaulua, which means "Two celestial bodies of fathomless powerful darkness in the brilliance of heat reincarnating energy into the universe." The compact quasar pair is seen as it was 900 million years after the Big Bang at a time when such supermassive black holes should not have had time to grow to such tremendous masses.

Nāpōwawāʻenakaulua isn't just the oldest and most distant quasar pairing ever seen.…