Think The Big Bang Theory in real life, but a lot less socially awkward: Popular astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson has no problem attracting women as the new host of Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey.
Tyson partnered with Seth Macfarlane to relaunch Carl Sagan’s ’80s TV series, Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, in a new science documentary series. The pair was recently featured in a GQ photo shoot, after which Tyson tweeted, “When the universe lands in a GQ shoot, you know science is trending in the world.”
What’s also trending is the way people are reacting to Tyson’s “Sexiest Astrophysicist” appeal, which Tyson humbly attributes to science, and not himself.
“When you tell people something that’s intellectually delectable, they can feel sensually towards it,” Tyson told PEOPLE. “But I think at the end of the day, the object of their affection is the universe.”
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Write to Diane Tsai at diane.tsai@time.com