Pulsars as the Heartbeat of the Cosmos - Why the Universe Keeps Time and What It Is Counting

A pulsar is a rapidly rotating neutron star that emits beams of electromagnetic radiation from its magnetic poles. As the star rotates, the beams sweep across space like a cosmic lighthouse,...

A pulsar is a rapidly rotating neutron star that emits beams of electromagnetic radiation from its magnetic poles.

As the star rotates, the beams sweep across space like a cosmic lighthouse, producing a pulse of radiation each time the beam crosses the observer's line of sight.

The pulses are so regular that when Jocelyn Bell Burnell first detected them in 1967, the research team designated them LGM-1 - Little Green Men - because the regularity seemed too precise to be natural.

The regularity is natural. It is produced by the conservation of angular momentum during the collapse of a stellar core.