Question: Can what you learn from the Cataclysmic Variables be used to understand and/or predict similar reactions on an atomic level?

Mark Kennedy answered on 10 Nov 2016:

So, the main component of a cataclysmic variable is the white dwarf which resides in its core. White dwarfs are amazing objects that aren’t supported by nuclear fusion (like typical stars) but instead by this thing called electron degeneracy pressure. In brief, you can only have so many electrons in once place before they start exerting an outside pressure, and white dwarfs are massive enough (about the mass of the Sun) and small enough (about the size of the Earth) that this degeneracy pressure is what supports them.

So studying cataclysmic variables helps us understand more about this pressure, and under what conditions this pressure fails. We think that if the mass of the white dwarf is about 1.4 times the mass of the Sun, then this degeneracy pressure no longer is strong enough to the support the star, and the star collapses in something we call a Type 1a supernova, which are really, really important events!