ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS REVIEWWhite dwarfs: Recent developments

Summary. During the last decade white dwarfs have become important as tools in many areas beyond traditional stellar physics: from the age determination of the stars in the solar neighborhood to the dating of open clusters and the distance determina-tion of globular clusters. They are primary candidates for the MACHO microlensing events, possibly for a stellar component of the dark halo, and for the supernova Ia progenitors. The recent developments in these areas are reviewed, but some highlights from more “mature ” areas such as stellar parameters, mass distributions, magnetic, and pulsating white dwarfs are also summarized briefly