The asteroid named after the mythological Pandora is 55 Pandora. It was the 55th minor planet to receive a permanent numbered designation, and the name refers to the woman in the ancient Greek story.
55 Pandora was discovered by the German astronomer Karl Theodor Robert Luther on September 10, 1858, at the Düsseldorf Observatory. It is a main-belt asteroid, meaning it travels around the Sun in the broad population of rocky bodies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.
This object is separate from Pandora, the small moon of Saturn. The asteroid and the moon share a mythological namesake but differ in location, type, and discovery history. The numbered format is important because asteroid names are commonly written with a number followed by the official name.
The asteroid is also distinct from 4 Vesta and 16 Psyche, which are much more widely discussed main-belt bodies. Its connection to Pandora is primarily historical and mythological rather than a claim that it resembles the story’s jar or character.