Z. Benkhaldoun

Every 3.97 days, the disk of the star TOI-1080 dims slightly. The shadow lasts a few hours — a planet passing in front of its star, like a fly in front of a lamp. Such 'eclipses' are caught by the TESS space telescope, which watches thousands of stars at once.

A spinning top launched into weightlessness doesn't just rotate around its axis: it also wobbles, like a drunken sailor. That's exactly how the asteroid Apophis behaves: it doesn't spin neatly but tumbles through space. On April 13, 2029, this celestial wanderer will whiz past at about 38,000 kilometers from Earth — closer than communications satellites.