Some fun stuff expected in 2016 in astrophysics...

[Anomalocaris]

A very large planet near a very small but very bright star would be a 'best case scenario' for seeing a shadow projected onto a conveniently nearby nebulosity.

Now, for the problems with that:

*very bright stars that are very small 'apparently' don't have planets

*very bright stars tend to be massive, regardless of physical size, so if there were a very large planet very close to one, it would have an enormous orbital velocity, and then unfortunately, the projected shadow is going to move very fast, our telescopes will need very large apertures to get exposure times fast enough at a high enough magnification that no one could afford to build such a telescope


So, the appropriate planets probably don't exist, and proving they do or don't is going to be very expensive.


Sorry . . .

Hmm, had an idea.

A planet in orbit around a neutron star?  The planet would be much bigger than the star, and if the planet is  close to the star compared to the nebulosity, it can cast a giant shadow, many times the planet's own size, on the nebulosity beyond.

There is at least one known family of exoplanets that orbit a neutron star.