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The Independent UK
The Independent UK
Laura Nicole Driessen

What is Chiron? The asteroid currently in retrograde

Hubble Space Telescope image of Chiron showing its fuzzy coma - (Hubble Space Telescope/Karen Meech, CC BY-SA)

You might have seen an interesting phrase popping up in your social media feeds lately: “Chiron is in retrograde.” If you’re anything like me, you’ve never heard of Chiron before – and I’m a professional astronomer.

So what is Chiron, and what does it mean to be in retrograde? The short answer is that Chiron is an asteroid-slash-comet orbiting somewhere past Jupiter and Saturn. And until January 2026, it’s going to look like it’s going backwards in the sky. If you can spot it.

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