Course: The Physics and Evolution of Active Galactic Nuclei
Lecturer: Yongquan Xue

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Proposal: general requirements

- can be a theoretical/observational/archival/simulation proposal
- due before proposal presentation (should be around the second last week of the semester) unless announced otherwise
- choose an AGN-related research topic by yourself (ideas arise from reading textbooks and papers as well as your OWN thinkings)
- must be written in English; the wording should be as concise and accurate as possible; overall length: >2000 words but <3000 words -- MANDATORY requirement!!
- try to use figures and/or tables effectively
- MUST NOT COPY texts from other papers; use your OWN words
- MUST NOT COPY EXACTLY other people's ideas/works; you can EXTEND previous ideas/works or even DEVELOP your OWN idea, even if it could be naive to some degree  
- electronic submission ONLY to lha@ustc.edu.cn (email subject: Your Name - AGN proposal)
- acceptable file formats: *.pdf, *.docx, *.doc, *.txt
- example observational and archival proposals (000_proposal_sample_?.pdf) for Chandra and XMM-Newton are PROVIDED for your reference
- guidance on how to prepare a strong proposal is enclosed below for your information

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Proposal: Format and required contents
          (note: you need to include all the listed contents; you can arrange these contents into different sections/subsections)

Course: The Physics and Evolution of Active Galactic Nuclei
Name:              Date:
Proposal title:
Proposal abstract: 

1. General introduction and overall scientific importance

2. Proposed research activities and specific science goals

3. Justification of (technical) feasibility

4. References

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Guidance: how to prepare a strong proposal

The main goal here is to get a feeling for real-world proposal 
preparation. Such a skill is essential for success in any 
branch of research astronomy, so hopefully this will be a 
practically useful experience for you.  

You can choose to write an AGN-related theory, observation, or archival proposal.
- theory proposals: use theories/models to address scientific problems
- observation proposals: propose new observations of any telescope(s) to address scientific problems
- archival proposals: utilize existing observations of any telescope(s) to address scientific problems

When preparing your proposal, please make sure it addresses all the
following questions effectively. This will be a very good start in 
ensuring a quality proposal. 

 * Choice of scientific problem
    1. Does the proposal address an important scientific problem?
    2. Is the overall importance of the scientific problem stated compellingly? 
    3. Do we know the answer to the problem already or not? 
    4. Does the proposer seem to understand the scientific problem in depth? 

 * Proposed research activities and specific science goals
   For theory/archival proposals:
    1. Are the proposed research activities (i.e., what theories/archival data to use and how to use them) stated clearly?
    2. Are the proposed research activities the best way to address the problem?
    3. Are the specific procedures/methodologies explained clearly?
    4. Are the specific science goals stated clearly?
    5. Can the proposed research activities effectively address the scientific problem?
    6. Is the proposal a good value? Is it likely to deliver a good amount of science relative to its funding support?
   For observation proposals:
    1. Are the proposed observations and targets presented clearly? 
    2. Are the proposed targets the best ones to address the problem? 
    3. Is the proposed observatory/telescope the best one for this project? 
    4. Are the specific measurements that will be made explained clearly? 
    5. Is it clear how the measurements will test hypotheses?
    6. Can the measurements effectively address the scientific problem? 
    7. Is the proposal a good value? Is it likely to deliver a good amount of science relative to its observational cost? 
 
 * Feasibility/Technical feasibility:
   For theory/archival proposals:
    1. Do the proposers have sufficient experience, expertise, computation resource, etc. to efficiently execute the project?
    2. What is the research plan? Is it viable?
    3. Can the project be finished within the proposed timeline?
   For observation proposals:
    1. Are target fluxes and other target parameters justified well?
    2. Is the expected data quality explained clearly? 
    3. Are realistic expected errors on measured parameters given? 
    4. Are the proposed exposure times justified clearly? 
    5. Does this proposal duplicate observations that have already been done? 
    6. Are there any other problems with the technical feasibility? 

 * Style
    1. Does the proposal read clearly? 
    2. Is the usage of English good? 
    3. Is the boldfacing and italicizing of text appropriate? 
    4. Are the figures and tables relevant and easily understandable?  
    5. Is the referencing of scientific papers appropriate?