Spacetime Torsion and Stellar Collapse Torsional Spacetime Compression: A Mechanical Engineering Approach to Stellar Lifetime Overestimates and Rapid Collapse Pathways

Standard stellar physics models the force balance inside a star as two opposing terms: gravitational compression inward and radiation pressure from nuclear fusion outward. This paper proposes a third force term that is absent from all current stellar models: torsional spacetime compression arising from the interaction between a rotating mass and the spacetime fabric it winds around itself. Every rotating mass drags and twists the spacetime fabric through the Lense-Thirring effect. The wound fabric exerts compression back on the rotating mass. This compression adds to internal stellar pressure, accelerates fuel consumption, and generates heat dissipated through the fabric as gravitational waves. Stellar lifetime calculations that omit this term systematically overestimate how long stars live. For non-spherical rotating masses, the gravitational wave energy drain is exponentially greater than spherical models predict, opening collapse pathways orders of magnitude faster than standard fusion-limited timescales. The framework generates two specific testable predictions: stellar spin-down rates should correlate with accelerated aging beyond current model predictions, and a subset of black holes should exhibit spin direction opposite to their progenitor stars — a signal of spacetime fabric torsion unwinding at the collapse point. The paper also proposes a reframing of Hawking radiation as fabric heat conduction rather than virtual particle pair production, and argues that the universe is a closed thermal system in which gravitational wave heat eventually returns to other massive objects through the fabric. No experimental data is presented. Priority of the conceptual framework is established by this publication date.