If a star’s mass is less than the Chandrasekhar limit, it can eventually stop contracting and settle down to a possible final state as a white dwarf with a radius of a few thousand miles and a density of hundreds of tons per cubic inch. A white dwarf is supported by the exclusion principle repulsion between the electrons in its matter. We observe a large number of these white dwarf stars. One of the first to be discovered is the star that is orbiting around Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky.
