- NASA's TESS satellite, launched in 2018, discovered a planet named Gaia23b using gravitational microlensing, a technique it wasn't designed for.
- Gaia23b orbits a star about 40,000 light-years away, far beyond the nearby stars TESS was intended to study, akin to capturing distant wildlife accidentally.
- The discovery was made after TESS's data, combined with Gaia's observations, revealed planetary ripples in microlensing events, with the signal unnoticed in archives for nearly three years.
- Researchers suggest that TESS's archives may contain more undiscovered microlensing planets, indicating potential for further surprises from the satellite.