How massive is a neutron star packed into a sphere only 10 to 20 kilometers across?
Answer
The mass equivalent of one or two Suns ($M_ eq$).
Neutron stars represent an intermediate stage of stellar collapse, possessing an incredible amount of mass confined to an astonishingly small volume, often comparable in diameter to a major city. Despite this small physical size, the object contains the collective mass accumulated from the core of the original star, amounting typically to the mass equivalent of one or two Suns. This leads to densities so severe that a small spoonful of this degenerate neutron fluid would possess a mass measured in billions of tons.
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