PHYS1160: Space Telescopes - Small Solar System Bodies - Essay Assessment

Essay Assessment Task

Essays will be graded on:

• Degree of understanding of the topic

• Quality and depth of research

• Clarity of presentation 

• Original and outstanding coverage of the topic 

Essay Topics — Choose one of the following

1. Space Telescopes

Explain why astronomers put telescopes in space. Describe the Hubble Space Telescope and some of its achievements. How will the forthcoming James Webb Space Telescope differ from Hubble and what new science should be possible with it.

2. The Earliest Evidence for Life

Review the earliest evidence for life on Earth. What form does the evidence take and where is it found? Discuss the controversies relating to some of this evidence and give your conclusion on the earliest date at which we can be confident that life was present on Earth.

3. Follow the Water

Why do astrobiologists think that liquid water is the most important requirement for life? What is the evidence for the past presence of liquid water on Mars? Is it possible that there is still liquid water on Mars today?

4. Life in Extreme Conditions

Explain what extremophile life forms are and where they are found on Earth. In view of what we have learnt about extremophiles discuss the possibility of extraterrestrial life in 3 different places of our Solar system.

5. Key Solar System Planetary Missions Choose ONE of the following space missions and give an account of the mission describing the challenges it had to overcome and the mission’s achievements. Describe in particular how it has influenced our understanding of the possibilities of past or present life in the solar system.

• The Viking dual orbiter/lander mission to Mars.

• The Galileo orbiter/probe mission to the Jupiter system.

• The Cassini/Huygens mission to the Saturn system.

• The Mars Exploration Rover mission (Spirit and Opportunity rovers).

6. Exploration of Venus Describe the history of missions to Venus and their achievements. How did we learn about the thick atmosphere and high surface temperature of Venus and how did we map its surface? Should we consider Venus as a possible site for life in our Solar system?

7. Gravitational Waves On Feb 11 2016 the announcement was made of the detection of gravitational waves from space using the Advanced LIGO facility. What are gravitational waves? How does LIGO detect them and why is this discovery significant?

8. Small Solar System Bodies

Describe how space missions have been used to study small Solar system bodies (comets and asteroids). What have we learned about these bodies? How might such studies help us understand the origin of life on Earth?

9. Inside stars

Explain how helioseismology and solar neutrinos help to study interior of the Sun. Based on two examples, a low mass star like our Sun and the star that is twenty times more massive than the Sun, discuss how the internal composition of the stars changes during their life.

10. Space mission to Pluto The “New Horizons” mission is exploring the outer Solar System.

Describe the objectives of the mission and important scientific instruments on the space probe. Discuss what we have learnt about Pluto after the closest approach to this dwarf planet. Explain how this mission helps us to understand the processes of formation and evolution of the planetary system.

11. Formation of planetary systems

Discuss the early ideas about the formation of our Solar system. Compare our solar system with other multi-planetary systems discovered in the last 20 years. Explain what we have learnt about formation of planets from these discoveries. Describe the concept of planetary migration.

12. Kepler and TESS

Compare the strategy and objectives of the NASA Kepler mission and the new TESS mission. Describe what observations are needed to confirm that an extra solar planet has 4 similar physical characteristics to our Earth. Discuss the role of the Kepler and TESS missions in the search for planets like the Earth.

13. Habitability of Planets

Explain what makes a planet habitable. In the context of currently known extra solar planetary systems discuss the likelihood of habitable planets in our Galactic neighbourhood. Describe some examples of recently discovered extra solar planets, which are suggested to be habitable and explain why.

14. Role model astronomer/astrobiologist

Science advances by efforts of large collective of collaborating people, but there are outstanding individuals that we all admire for their role in moving us forward in understanding our world. Choose your favourite contemporary (that is born not earlier than the twentieth century) astronomer or astrobiologist that you learnt about in studying this course, and describe their contribution to their field of research. Explain why this person inspired you personally.

15. The Standard Cosmological Model Describe the standard cosmological model (also known as the Lambda-CDM model of the universe).

What is the observational evidence that supports the model?

16. The Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence

Explain what is SETI and how it approaches the search for the ET. Explain why radio telescopes are particularly useful in such a search. If we contact an advanced extraterrestrial civilization discuss how likely it is that we will benefit from the encounter through, for example, the information they may provide on advanced technologies, or are we likely to suffer through the hostility of a species that competes for our resources and perhaps our planet? Based on your assessment should we be advertising our presence by sending messages to the stars or would we be better keeping quiet? Factors you may wish to consider could include:

• Do we expect advanced intelligent species to be friendly or hostile to other species (based on evolutionary theory, and the requirements of survival of such a species)? • Has the human race developed more, or less, tolerance of different peoples and cultures as civilization has developed?

• The historical record of encounters between colonial and indigenous peoples on Earth.

• Our record of treatment of closely related species such as the great apes.

• The vast distances between stars and the difficulty of physical contact with extraterrestrial neighbours.

17. Manned Missions to Mars

There is discussion of sending a crewed mission to Mars in the future. Discuss the challenges for such a mission, and how such a mission could be executed. Describe possible benefits and drawbacks of such a mission in comparison with the previous and future robotic exploration of Mars.