"The Pandora team is hoping to find biosignatures - chemicals that can only be produced by a living organism such as oxygen, carbon dioxide and methane - which provide evidence of past or present life, though the chance of finding those gases is almost infinitely small, said Peter McGill, an optical astronomer on the Pandora Mission. But data gathered in the project could help answer some of humanity's biggest questions."
"The Pandora mission will be the first satellite launched into space as part of the Pioneers Program - a name that serves as an homage to NASA's original Pioneers Programs that explored planets in our solar system - that will expand the horizons of the original program to capture information from planets 100 light years away."
Pandora will launch a small satellite from Vandenberg Space Force Base for a 13-month mission to observe atmospheric conditions of 20 exoplanets as they eclipse their suns. The mission targets planets orbiting vibrant, young stars and aims to measure host-star properties to reduce "solar contamination" that produces false signals. The team will search for biosignatures such as oxygen, carbon dioxide and methane, while acknowledging the detection probability is extremely low. Data from Pandora will support James Webb Space Telescope observations and expand the Pioneers Program to collect information from planets about 100 light years away.
Read at The Mercury News
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