Chroniton

A chroniton (or chronoton) is a small purple orb that are unstable in the field of time and can cause time to lurch forwards. Professor Farnsworth had his crew collect them to speed up the growth of his Mutant Atomic Supermen. However, upon collecting them, the loss of chronitons caused time to leak (which smells really bad) and time began to skip forward, randomly. They eventually solved the problem by destroying a cluster of stars. They are also able to cause time to skip backwards, to change peoples' DNA (or a robot's RNA) to make them younger, as The Bubbling Geezer tar pits contain chronitons that made the Planet Express crew a lot younger.