X-ray pulsar that spins fast enough to become a millisecond pulsar once it has consumed its accretion disc.

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For the first time, scientists working at the Hubble Space Telescope were able to directly observe a quasar accretion disc.

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Material in the vicinity gets drawn in, and settles into a disc, called an accretion disc, that's constantly spiraling toward the black hole.

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By then, the outer layers of its companion star have been completely torn away and the accretion disc has vanished: millisecond pulsars do not have accretion discs.

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Since the inner part of the accretion disc orbits faster than once a second, as the hot gas ploughs into the neutron star's surface, it torques the star up to ever higher speeds.

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Stars are the result of the gravitational collapse of huge clouds of gas and dust, whereas planets are thought to evolve by the accretion of the material left over from such collapses, which forms a rotating disc around the newly created star.

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