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Oddball Pulsating Star Hiccups as It Spins

Astronomers have discovered a weird compact spinning star whose rotation has sped up slightly, causing it to be hidden until now.

The star is what’s called a pulsar, made of the condensed remnants of a normal star that have been squeezed down to a much smaller volume. This compression has caused the star’s rotation to accelerate to roughly seven times a second.

Pulsars are so called because they appear to pulse on and off, as beams of light pointing from their poles sweep toward Earth and away.

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