Supermassive stars might be born in the chaos around supermassive black holes

If you asked me where the most massive stars in the Universe might exist, the last place I'd guess would be in hellish accretion disks around supermassive black holes.

Yet a new paper looking at how stars would behave near these black holes shows exactly this. According to this theoretical work they can either form there and grow huge, or form nearby and be captured, whereupon then they'd grow huge.

I can't remember the last time I read a journal paper and muttered “holy crap” under my breath ...