Tucson Standard

NASA's Pandora mission is progressing towards its launch, with the spacecraft bus now completed. This development was announced at the 245th Meeting of the American Astronomical Society in National Harbor, Maryland. The mission's operations will be based at the University of Arizona Space Institute.

"This is a huge milestone for us and keeps us on track for a launch in the fall," said Elisa Quintana, Pandora's principal investigator at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. "The bus holds our instruments and handles navigation, data acquisition and communication with Earth – it's the brains of the spacecraft."

Pandora aims to study over 20 known exoplanets to analyze their atmospheres, focusing on elements like hazes, clouds, and water. The data collected will complement findings from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope and future missions exploring habitable worlds.

"Although smaller and less sensitive than Webb, Pandora will be able to stare longer at the host stars of extrasolar planets, allowing for deeper study," said Daniel Apai, professor of astronomy and planetary sciences at the University of Arizona Steward Observatory and Lunar and Planetary Laboratory. He leads Pandora’s Exoplanets Science Working Group.

The mission addresses challenges in observing starlight passing through exoplanet atmospheres during transits. Variations in light from stars can obscure or mimic signals researchers seek when evaluating an exoplanet's potential habitability.

"In 2018, a doctoral student in my group, Benjamin Rackham – now an MIT research scientist – described an astrophysical effect by which light coming directly from the star muddies the signal of the light passing through the exoplanet's atmosphere," Apai explained. "We predicted that this effect would limit Webb's ability to study habitable planets."

Pandora uses a novel telescope developed by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Corning Specialty Materials to capture both visible brightness and near-infrared spectra simultaneously. This approach helps distinguish between stellar surface properties and planetary signals.

Karl Harshman leads Pandora’s Mission Operations Team at the University of Arizona Space Institute. He stated: "We have a very excited team that has been working hard to have our Mission Operations Center running at full speed at the time of launch and look forward to receiving science data."

Pandora is led by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center with project management by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. The telescope was manufactured by Corning with collaborative development by Livermore. Blue Canyon Technologies provided the spacecraft bus while NASA Ames Research Center will handle data processing.