In weightlessness, a scorching-hot skillet and a pat of butter whirl around. This is a massive white dwarf (a star whose maximum mass was calculated by Chandrasekhar) and its lightweight companion, rich in helium. Gravity makes the butter drip onto the skillet, and along the way it forms a glowing ring — an accretion disk. This disk is heated to millions of degrees and shines brightly in X-rays and ultraviolet. By splitting the light into colors (spectroscopy), astronomers learn the temperature and composition. The pair's rapid rotation generates gravitational waves — ripples in space itself.

Scientists built a detailed numerical model based on the work of Kepler and Planck. It calculates the binary system's emission, accounting for stellar aging (evolution), chemical composition (metallicity), and cosmic dust in the interstellar medium. To quickly decode signals, they used machine learning — a neural network trained on millions of examples. Now it accurately predicts masses and orbits even from incomplete data.