In astronomy, the asteroid named Pandora has the official designation 55 Pandora. The number indicates its place in the sequence of numbered minor planets, while Pandora is its name.
George Mary Searle discovered 55 Pandora on September 10, 1858, from the Albany Observatory in New York. It is a main-belt asteroid, meaning it travels around the Sun in the broad region between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter where many asteroids are found.
The designation is easy to confuse with the name of Saturn’s moon Pandora. They are separate objects: 55 Pandora is an asteroid orbiting the Sun, whereas Pandora is a small natural satellite orbiting Saturn. Numbering minor planets helps astronomers distinguish similarly named bodies across the Solar System.