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    Little red dots as hidden neutrino sources

    Riku Kuze1,*, Kunihito Ioka1,†, Kohta Murase2,1,‡, Shigeo S. Kimura3,4,§, and Kohei Inayoshi5,∥

    • 1Center for Gravitational Physics and Quantum Information, Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics, Kyoto, Kyoto 606-8502 Japan
    • 2Department of Physics; Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics; Center for Multimessenger Astrophysics, Institute for Gravitation and the cosmos, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA
    • 3Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences, Tohoku University, Sendai 980-8578, Japan
    • 4Astronomical Institute, Graduate School of Science, Tohoku University, Sendai 980-8578, Japan
    • 5Kavli Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China

    • *Contact author: riku.kuze@yukawa.kyoto-u.ac.jp
    • †Contact author: kunihito.ioka@yukawa.kyoto-u.ac.jp
    • ‡Contact author: murase@psu.edu
    • §Contact author: shigeo@astr.tohoku.ac.jp
    • ∥Contact author: inayoshi.pku@gmail.com

    Phys. Rev. D 113, 083048 – Published 28 April, 2026

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/vbfz-ncxd

    Abstract

    Little red dots (LRDs) are enigmatic, compact, red galaxies at high redshift, z∼4–7, discovered by the James Webb Space Telescope. Broad emission lines in the absence of x-ray and radio counterparts suggest that they host accreting supermassive black holes embedded in dense gaseous envelopes. This black-hole-envelope configuration facilitates efficient photohadronic interactions and neutrino production. Remarkably, their observed source number density and luminosity are compatible with the energetics of the diffuse neutrino background. We consider that relativistic jets and outflows are launched from the black hole and propagate through low-density polar funnels within envelopes, where particle acceleration and neutrino emission occur. This leads to LRDs being effectively hidden sources. Our analytic and numerical calculations show that, in an optimistic scenario, LRDs can contribute ∼30% of the observed diffuse background at TeV–sub-PeV energies, predominantly through photomeson production. At high neutrino energies, ≳105.5  GeV, inverse-Compton cooling of muons modifies the resulting flavor ratio, providing a distinctive diagnostic for IceCube-Gen2 and other upcoming neutrino telescopes.

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