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Neutron Stars/X-ray Binaries
Chandra image of the Vela Pulsar
(NASA/PSU/G.Pavlov et al)
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Ordinary matter, or the stuff we and everything around us is made of, consists
largely of empty space. Even a rock is mostly empty space. This is because matter
is made of atoms. An atom is a cloud of electrons orbiting around a nucleus composed of protons and neutrons.
The nucleus contains more than 99.9 percent of the mass of an atom, yet it has a
diameter of only 1/100,000 that of the electron cloud. The electrons themselves
take up little space, but the pattern of their orbit defines the size of the
atom, which is therefore 99.9999999999999% open space!
What we perceive as painfully solid when we bump against a rock is really a
hurly-burly of electrons moving through empty space so fast that we can't
see—or feel—the emptiness. What would matter look like if it weren't
empty, if we could crush the electron cloud down to the size of the nucleus?
Suppose we could generate a force strong enough to crush all the emptiness out of
a rock roughly the size of a football stadium. The rock would be squeezed down to
the size of a grain of sand and would still weigh 4 million tons!
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