To understand the scientific objectives of exploration Venus, we need to look at the work of VEXAG. The analysis group Exploration of Venus (Venus EXploration Analyses Group) was founded by the NASA in 2005 to identify the priorities of Venus’ exploration and propose opportunities in this area.
Goi
To define priorities, Vexag has drawn up a list of goals, objectives and abbreviated investigations (GOI).
Goal
Goals are a general questioning on a broad aspect and may have implications for other areas of the world space or terrestrial science. The goal comes down to the sentence “understand…… ».
Objective
In a GOI process the objectives are presented in the form of fairly specific questions about the purpose to which the objective belongs. The answer to these questions allows us to have a more complete knowledge of the goal.
Investigation
An investigation involves looking for concrete elements that must be found (or proved that it does not exist), quantify and analyze. Their discovery (or the discovery that there is none) allows to answer the question posed by the goal and to advance in the understanding of the goal. They are prioritized according to whether they are:
Essentials (1): If all essential investigations of an objective are met, we should have a clear answer to the question of purpose.
Important (2): they provide a better understanding of the context but cannot be definitively decided
Targeted (3): they allow information on a specific point without offering a complete view of the situation
below is a link to Goals, Objectives, and Investigations for Venus Exploration (2019)
