Pandora’s Box: How NASA and Citizen Scientists Help Avert Disaster

Last month, Dr. Waalkes gave a presentation on how stellar activity could drastically alter the interpretation of an exoplanet’s atmospheric composition. This month, join Dr. Rob Zellem (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center) as he talks about NASA’s Pandora SmallSat mission, which is scheduled to launch no earlier than Fall 2025 and will monitor ≥20 transiting exoplanets and their host stars to disentangle stellar activity from the planet’s atmospheric signal. Pandora’s efforts will help enhance the science returns of NASA missions like Hubble and JWST. He will also present how citizen scientists and amateur astronomers can become involved and already are directly contributing to the Pandora mission and other NASA efforts.