Your project is to design a mission to any object in our solar system. That could be a planet, any moon(s), asteroids, or some combination. Your mission report must include these 4 points:

1. Mission goals- what do you want to learn from your mission?
2. Instrument list- what instruments and equipment will your mission use to meet those goals?
3. A budget- You must show your expenses.
4. A budget justification- you must justify your budget. Why should the government, and taxpayers such as yourselves and your parents pay for this mission? Remember, people who give the money usually are not scientists.

This paper should be in the form of a proposal: "We wish to do XX so we can determine XX and that will mean XX."

No more than 6 pages, double-spaced.
No cover pages. Include the names of everyone in your group alphabetically by last name.
At the end of your paper, including a summary of everyone's contribution. If someone did not contribute, then they will not receive full credit.
Be sure to include an introduction (brief overview) and a summary paragraph. Be persuasive!

Equipment Expenses:
NOTE: The cost depends on where you're going. For any of the terrestrial planets, use the prices below, as shown. For Jupiter, multiply by 1.2, for Saturn, multiply by 1.4, for Uranus or Neptune multiply by 1.6 and for Pluto multiply by 2. Additionally, if the mission is round trip, multiply all of your costs (including previous multipliers) by 2.5 (except for missions with people, that is already accounted for in those costs).

• Stereo camera: $50 million
• Gamma ray spectrometer: $25 million
• X-ray spectrometer: $25 million
• Optical spectrometer: $20 million
• Small Rover (can carry 2 instruments and a camera): $80 million (including optical camera)
• Large Rover (can carry 4 instruments and a camera): $250 million (including optical camera)
• Rover scoop and mini chemical analysis lab: $45 million
• Satellite (can carry 3 instruments or 1 instrument and a lander): $170 million
• Super-satellite: can carry 6 instruments, or 3 instruments and a lander): $600 million
  NOTE that the satellites include the cost of launch in their prices. And you cannot put a lander and/or rover on a planet without a satellite, which communicates between Earth and the lander/rover.
• Lander (can carry 3 instruments, or 1 instrument and a rover): $250 million
• Remote helicopter/drone (can carry 2 instruments): $350 million
• Weather station: $40 million
• Seismic stations (cluster of 3): $13 million
• Surface penetrating radar: $55 million
• Laser altimeter: $30 million
• Human mission (transit only: 4 people): $40 billion
• Human's at the body: $30 million per day
• Drill: This depends on how deep you want to drill. I will supply 2 sets of prices for each depth range- the first will be for a mechanical drill (which can drill through anything- rock, ice, snow, whatever) and the second will be a heat drill which can only drill through ice (by melting it) and uses radioactive material as part of the heat source (contained, so it doesn't leak, but nothing can be contained forever):
  • Mechanical drill:
    • 1/2 inch- $5 million
    • 6 inches (1/2 foot)- $35 million
    • 1 meter (3 feet)- $85 million
    • 10 meters (33 feet)- $250 million
    • 100 meters (330 feet)- $750 million
    • 1 km (0.6 miles)- $1 billion
    • 50km (35 miles)- $3 billion
  • Heat drill:
    • 1/2 inch- $5 million
    • 6 inches (1/2 foot)- $10 million
    • 1 meter (3 feet)- $25 million
    • 10 meters (33 feet)- $75 million
    • 100 meters (330 feet)- $350 million
    • 1 km (0.6 miles)- $700 million
    • 50km (35 miles)- $2 billion
• Grapple (to grab an object)
  Depends on the object's size:
  • Pebble (<1 inch) sized: $2 million
  • Rock (1-5 inches) sized: $5 million
  • Big rock (up to 1 foot across): $20 million
• Climate-controlled capsule (not for people)
  Depends on the size of what you want to hold:
  • Pebble/rock sized: $20 million
  • Boulder sized (few feet across): $50 million
  (Consider just wrapping your object in a foil bag for $5 million)
  
  
• If you need other instruments, let me know and I will give you a price.
• If you find the price for a specific instrument, be sure to reference it.

Cost of some previous missions:

• JUNO (at Jupiter now): $1.1 billion.
• Rosetta comet mission: $1.1 billion.
• New Horizons (Pluto): $700 million.
• Cassini-Huygens (Saturn): $3.26 billion.
• Galileo Mission (Jupiter): $1.6 billion (for first 5 years)
• Voyager 2 Mission (launched in 1972): $865 million
• Mars Pathfinder: $171 million
• Mars Global Surveyor: $154 million
• Mars Polar Lander (crashed): $165 million
• Mars Climate Orbiter (also crashed): $155 million
• Nozomi (Japanese satellite): $86 million
• Mars Express (European Space Agency: Satellite and lander/rover): $353 million
• Mars Twin Rovers (table-sized): $800 million each
• Mars Perserverance (car-sized): $2.4 billion.

Resources: Use previous missions to find out what they have done:

• Rosetta mission. A question-and-answer page about this mission.
• Juno mission at Jupiter now.
• New Horizons the Pluto mission.
• Galileo mission Interesting site hosted by Georgia State University.
• The Galileo mission homepage By the actual scientists.
• The Voyager homepage. The spacecraft that flew past Jupiter in the 1980s.
• 2001 Mars Odyssey
• Mars exploration homepage Your gateway to Mars!
• Another good Mars site. Has a list of missions to Mars.

The paper will be graded based on

• Formatting: following the format guide above.
• Science content: how appropriate is the science you wish to do and how well do the instruments you have described match your goals?
• Budget: Is your budget accurate?
• Budget justification: Is what you want to learn worth the cost of your mission?
• Papers must be turned in hardcopy (print).