For this portion of your Final Project you will come up with a simple statement that describes what you want to learn/research and the mission or observations you are proposing. For this project we want to focus on objects outside of our own solar system, which can be within our Milky Way, or objects far away like distant galaxies, black holes, quasars, etc. (NOTE: you may not research extrasolar planets.) For your proposal, you will need to estimate the cost and time associated with your mission or observations, and also take into account the technology we currently have or are currently working on. Note that some missions can span decades or cost millions of dollars. Make sure to research a few real-life missions to get a feel for what cost were and how long it took to complete the mission. What are you interested in exploring or researching that could advance our knowledge of stars, galaxies, black holes, etc.? NOTE: your mission will need to be on observation mission conducted from Earth. This could be anything, such as: Based on the above, write a well thought vision s
tatement. This should consist of a short paragraph, not more than 5 sentences, that outlines your strategic plan, taking into account: An example from the WMAP mission could have been something like: “The Big Bang theory of the universe allows plenty of room for variations in the details (parameters) of the actual structure and behavior of our universe. These “free parameters” are important, but must be determined by observations, not theory. The parameters effect very basic aspects of our universe: Since the CMB radiation was emitted so long ago (and far away), it carries a great deal of information about the properties of our universe which can be measured in no other way. This early radiation was effected everywhere by the physics of matter within the bounds set by the parameters. So we have a large statistical sample of microwave radiation (across the whole sky) to help us determine these parameters. will be able to measure the CMB patterns of radiation with tremendous accuracy and it will be able to accurately determine most of the basic parameters of cosmology.”