When a star comes to the end of its life-cycle, its demise is determined by its mass. An average star, like the Sun, will become a white dwarf star. More massive stars have a more violent end in store for them: a crushing gravitational collapse followed by a supernova explosion.

A neutron star is a stellar corpse remaining after a star has taken the latter path. When the atomic neutron was discovered in 1932, theoretical scientists suggested that if the material in a star could be subjected to high enough pressure, its electrons could be forced into its atomic nuclei, forming a star composed of neutrons. Astronomers Walter Baade and Fritz Zwicky theorized that a Type II supernova explosion could provide that necessary pressure.

The discovery of the first neutron star did not occur until 1967. While investigating astronomical objects with a radio telescope, Jocelyn Bell, a graduate...