The hypotheses concerning Tabby’s Star, aka KIC 8462852, continue to accumulate. This one, reported by NewScientist (14 January 2017), sounds plausible:
If Tabby’s star devoured a planet in the past, the planet’s energy would have made the star temporarily brighten, then gradually dim to its original state. Depending on the size of the planet, this event could have happened anywhere between 200 and 10,000 years ago.
As the planet fell into its star, it could have been ripped apart or had its moons stripped away, leaving debris orbiting the star in eccentric orbits. Every time the debris passes between us and the star, it would block some light, making it seem as if the star is blinking (arxiv.org/abs/1612.07332).
A good, physics-based explanation for the behavior is always preferable to alien intelligences, if not quite so much fun.
