January 9, 2026, 9:06 PM EST. NASA's Pandora spacecraft will study exoplanet transits to separate planetary signals from stellar noise. As starlight passes through a planet's atmosphere, molecules such as water and oxygen leave fingerprints, but signals can be obscured by bright and dark regions on the star that evolve over time. Pandora will observe at least 20 exoplanets and their host stars in its first year, ten 24-hour sessions per planet, before and during transits. The mission addresses how stellar surface features affect measurements and follows discoveries from TESS. Pandora uses a novel all-aluminum 17-inch telescope and a near-infrared detector from JWST, and is the first satellite in NASA's Astrophysics Pioneers program, aimed at low-cost, high-impact science.
