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What object lies at the center of the Crab Nebula?

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Supernova Composite image of Kepler's Nova, or Kepler's Supernova, taken by the Chandra X-ray Observatory.

At the center of the Crab Nebula lies the Crab pulsar (catalog number NP 0532).1

Identified in the late 1960s, this object is a neutron star—the collapsed, extremely dense remnant of the supernova observed in 1054. The pulsar rotates rapidly, flashing 30 times per second across various wavelengths, including radio, visible, X-ray, and gamma-ray. This rotation provides the continuous energy required for the nebula to glow, as the pulsar loses rotational energy while it gradually slows down.123