Just as this star is doing, our own sun will release its outer layers, rich in heavy elements, gently into outer space. Our sun's material will mix with vast clouds of hydrogen gas and the death-debris of many other stars. The gas cloud will eventually turn into another star and solar system, enriched by what our sun bequeaths. This is recycling on a cosmic scale. Every subsequent generation of stars forms out of richer material than the previous generation.

As the outer layers of the sun are released, the sun's core will shrink as the weight of the overlying layers continues to squeeze. As the shrinking continues, electrons will put up quite a fight. Electrons don't like to get too close to each other, and so electrons will resist further compaction. It's electron pressure that will halt further collapse of the core. In a low mass star like our sun, gravity will not be able to overcome the electrons' resistance. What's left will be the dead hulk of our sun's core: a hunk of ultra compressed carbon—essentially a huge diamond about the size of earth. This is what astronomers call a white dwarf. A white dwarf is so compact that one teaspoon of white dwarf here on earth would weigh two tons.
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