Sinking of Ne-22 in Liquid White Dwarf Interiors
  We assess the impact of the trace element Ne-22 on the cooling and seismology of a liquid C/O white dwarf (WD). Due to this element's neutron excess, it sinks towards the interior as the liquid WD cools. The gravitational energy released slows the WD's cooling by 0.5-1.6 Gyr. In addition the Ne-22 abundance gradient changes the periods of the high radial order g-modes at the 1% level. 
Christopher J. Deloye (UCSB Dept. of Physics), Lars Bildsten (Kavli   Institute for Theoretical Physics and UCSB Dept. of Ph...