Geography of Space: Mapping the Universe Beyond Earth

Did you ever lose your way while going on a trip and used maps to help you? But what if I tell you that satellites are mapping the moon and Mars? Isn’t it amazing? It's called cosmology “Cosmic” meaning space and “logy" which means study. What if this process happens beyond the solar system? Our earth can control everything.

You might think that mapping the extraterrestrial bodies is irrelevant and not related to our day-to-day life. But this can help when our future generations need to travel to planets like Mars when Earth is not suitable.

History of planetary mapping
The days when our ancestors were wandering and gazing at stars and planets, marked the start of space mapping. In ancient times, people studied the celestial bodies and stars, and based on that they mapped the Earth and outer space. Without the help of these great astronomers, we would be not even close to finding the Earth’s coordinates. In those ancient times, explorers and scientists proved that the earth was round and estimated the earth’s size accurately.

On the Moon
The start of space mapping began when NASA's Ranger probes used television cameras. Five more orbiters like the probes were deployed from 1961 to 1968. These missions resulted in over 500 maps of the Moon from local to global, before 1975!

Explore
Conquer the knowledge of star charts, get to know about 3D space mapping, get encouraged to learn about Cosmic Microwave Background, check out the Cosmic Web, Exoplanet Catalogues, Gravitational Lensing, and many more. However, there are some interesting and sticky challenges to acquiring this knowledge.

The obstacles
The universe is expanding extremely fast at the rate of 1.6 million miles per second. The time for Inventions is constantly running out. Our universe is 93 billion light-years big. So there is no Idea of even traveling that much just for a map. such an immense scale requires advanced telescopes and observation techniques.

The other energies. What if we sent a satellite deep in space far away from the solar system and a Black hole or wormhole sucked it up along the satellite's path? All the hard work in vain

Advantages even if we didn’t succeed

Telescopes:
Know more advanced technologies about Ground-based and space telescopes that capture images and data from distant celestial objects, enabling detailed mapping.

Satellites:
knowing clearer knowledge Space-based observatories, like the Hubble Space Telescope, provide a clearer view of space by avoiding Earth's atmosphere.

Supercomputing:
Complex simulations and data analysis rely on powerful supercomputers to process vast amounts of information. Studying the light from distant objects allows astronomers to look back in time. By mapping the oldest visible objects, scientists gain insights into the early stages of the universe.

Cosmic evolution maps the changes in the universe's structure and composition over billions of years, helping scientists comprehend its past and predict its future.