White dwarf fundamentals

Abstract

This chapter provides an in-depth overview of white dwarfs, the evolutionary terminus of the vast majority of stars. It discusses their discovery, their nature as degenerate objects, their connections to earlier phases of stellar evolution, their subsequent evolution as they gradually cool down, the varied physical conditions from their dense cores to their tenuous atmospheres, some key statistics about the properties of the ever expanding population of known white dwarfs, the diversity of their spectra, the accretion of planetary material, and the presence of magnetic fields. The chapter also highlights the instrumental role of white dwarfs in other areas of astronomy.