Pandora

Pandora [JHU/APL]

NASA's Pandora is a SmallSat mission designed to study the atmospheres of exoplanets, and was selected as part of NASA's Astrophysics Pioneers Program. Pandora will collect visible and near IR observations of exoplanets during transit, and will study both the planet atmosphere and the host star variability using long time baseline observations. Pandora will study 20 unique exoplanets.

The purpose of the Pandora mission is to improve the interpretation of exoplanet transmission spectra. During planetary transits, starlight filtered through a planet’s atmosphere can reveal atmospheric composition, but variability on the host star can distort these measurements. A central objective is to quantify and correct for stellar contamination caused by starspots and other surface features. Pandora performs long-term monitoring of host stars in visible light while simultaneously collecting near-infrared spectra during planetary transits. This approach allows separation of stellar and planetary signals. After correcting for stellar effects, the mission aims to identify exoplanets with hydrogen- or water-dominated atmospheres and to distinguish planets with clear atmospheres from those dominated by clouds or hazes. The results are intended to support target selection for the James Webb Space Telescope and future missions focused on the search for habitable worlds.

The payload was developed by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in cooperation with several partners. The telescope belongs to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's (LLNL) CODA family and is produced by Corning. The IR and visible detectors are being provided by NASA GSFC. LLNL is designing instrument readout electronics and handling the system's thermal design which requires a cryocooler and associated control electronics. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center supplied the infrared detector and associated electronics. The ESPA size spacecraft bus is being provided by Blue Canyon Technologies (BCT). BCT will perform spacecraft integration and environmental testing. NASA ARC is providing advanced science data processing for the mission.

Pandora carries an all-aluminum Cassegrain telescope with an aperture of 45 cm and an external baffle to suppress stray light. A beam-splitting mirror separates incoming light between two channels, enabling simultaneous photometric and spectroscopic observations. The visible-light channel operates over a wavelength range of approximately 0.38 to 0.75 micrometers and is used to monitor stellar brightness variations. The near-infrared channel covers roughly 0.87 to 1.63 micrometers and is dedicated to transit spectroscopy. The near-infrared detector is a Teledyne HAWAII-2RG sensor originally manufactured as a flight spare for the James Webb Space Telescope NIRCam instrument. To ensure measurement stability, the detector is cooled to below 110 K using an onboard cryocooler and thermal control system.

Pandora was launched on 11 January 2026 aboard a SpaceX rideshare mission designated “Twilight.” The spacecraft was inserted into a Sun-synchronous low Earth orbit, where it is planned to conduct approximately one year of scientific operations.