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A white dwarf is a compact stellar remnant supported mainly by electron degeneracy pressure. Its ions carry most of the mass, while its Electrons provide most of the supporting pressure. The Pauli exclusion principle makes compression fill quantum states with larger momenta; support therefore persists even when thermal motion becomes small. Cooling and hydrostatic equilibrium are separate questions: a white dwarf can radiate stored energy while retaining degeneracy support.

The surprising trend is that a more massive cold white dwarf is smaller. Its higher mass density raises the Fermi momentum, eventually requiring special relativity. The degenerate-electron pressure crossover explains why this response approaches a limiting stiffness and why the Chandrasekhar limit exists. Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar's 1983 lecture develops this connection between quantum statistics, stellar structure and stellar evolution.^[ref]