JWST’s little red dots mystery FINALLY solved?! | Night Sky News June 2026

This video is sponsored by MEL Science. Get a year of science for just $22.45 per month! Visit https://melscience.com/sBgo/ and use code DRBECKY12 at checkout. This special offer is available until August 3rd #MELScience #STEM #ScienceEducation Welcome back to Night Sky News for June 2026! In this episode we’re chatting about the big news from JWST as we get closer to an explanation for the little red dots, plus the latest Artemis drama with the announcement of the crew for Artemis III. And as always, what you can see in the night sky this coming month! Papers mentioned: Kokorev et al. (2026) - https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ae4ed7/pdf Labbe et al. (2023) https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ad3551/pdf Matthee et al. (2024) - https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ad2345/pdf Kokorev et al. (2024) - https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ad4265/pdf Labbé et al (2023) - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-05786-2 Casey et al. (2025) - https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/adfa91/pdf Yue et al. (2024) - https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/ad7eba/pdf Kokubo & Harikane (2025) - https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ae119e/pdf Perger et al. (2025) - https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/pdf/2025/01/aa52422-24.pdf Gloudemans et al. (2025) - https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/adddb9/pdf Killi et al. (2024) - https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/pdf/2024/11/aa48857-23.pdf Wang et al. (2025) - https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/adc1ca/pdf Previous videos: JWST's "too massive" galaxy problem solved?! - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4KH1Jw6HBI 00:00 - Introduction 01:02 - Stargazing 07:48 - Artemis III Crew Announcement 12:45 - JWST’s Little Red Dots 22:34 - Bloopers Video filmed on a Sony ⍺7 IV Video edited by Martino Gasparrini: [email protected] Video produced by Marina Hui & Dr Becky Smethurst --- 📚 My book, "A Brief History of Black Holes", out NOW in hardback, paperback, e-book and audiobook (which I narrated myself!): http://lnk.to/DrBecky --- 👕 My merch, including JWST designs, are available here (with worldwide shipping!): https://dr-becky.teemill.com/ --- 🎧 Royal Astronomical Society Podcast that I co-host: podfollow.com/supermassive --- 🔔 Don't forget to subscribe and click the little bell icon to be notified when I post a new video! --- 👩🏽‍💻 I'm Dr. Becky Smethurst, an astrophysicist at the University of Oxford. I love making videos about science with an unnatural level of enthusiasm. I like to focus on how we know things, not just what we know. And especially, the things we still don't know. If you've ever wondered about something in space and couldn't find an answer online - you can ask me! My day job is to do research into how supermassive black holes can affect the galaxies that they live in. In particular, I look at whether the energy output from the disk of material orbiting around a growing supermassive black hole can stop a galaxy from forming stars. http://drbecky.uk.com