Science Goals
The goal of APOLLO is to push LLR into the millimeter range precision, which then translates directly into an order-of-magnitude improvement in the determination of fundamental physics parameters. Specifically, assuming improvements of a factor of ten over prior measurements, APOLLO will test:
- the Weak Equivalence Principle (WEP) to a part in ,
- the Strong Equivalence Principle (SEP) to a few parts in ,
- de Sitter relativistic precession to a few parts in, and
- the time variation of the Gravitational constant G to a part in per year.
Read more about this topic: Apache Point Observatory Lunar Laser-ranging Operation
Famous quotes containing the words science and/or goals:
“The belief that established science and scholarship—which have so relentlessly excluded women from their making—are “objective” and “value-free” and that feminist studies are “unscholarly,” “biased,” and “ideological” dies hard. Yet the fact is that all science, and all scholarship, and all art are ideological; there is no neutrality in culture!”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)
“If people would forget about utopia! When rationalism destroyed heaven and decided to set it up here on earth, that most terrible of all goals entered human ambition. It was clear there’d be no end to what people would be made to suffer for it.”
—Nadine Gordimer (b. 1923)