The television series "Star Trek" calls space the "final frontier." The brave men and women aboard the USS Enterprise, under Captain James T. Kirk, exemplified human ambition, courageously going where no man had gone before. While these characters may be fictional, their desire to explore new realms is entirely real. Humanity was driven to explore before developing written language. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Today man no longer has a New World to discover or a West to colonize. We have explored nearly every piece of land on our home planet, but have never dared venture more than 250,000 miles away from our pale blue dot. The potential for untold scientific discoveries lies beyond our home planet; but first we must find a way to explore the great expanse of space. For this reason, I chose to pursue a degree in Aerospace Engineering, hoping to work in the space program. Space exploration offers numerous benefits to humanity. From memory foam to light-emitting diodes, hundreds of everyday conveniences have their roots in the space program. Space exploration allows us to better understand the mechanisms of our universe, allowing us to protect ourselves from the threat of an asteroid impact. Even without these benefits, however, we are still forced to push ourselves into the unknown. Humanity has yet to overcome its desire to conquer the frontier, and we will continue to push towards our final frontier, beyond the edges of our planet. Our next step in slowly advancing into the vastness of space is to place a man on the surface of the planet. Mars. Critics argue that this is an impossible feat; a mission to Mars is over 100 times farther than any human has ever traveled from our planet. Of course, it's a tall order. Equally daunting, however, was the 1969 lunar mission, when Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon. Landing on the Moon required a series of innovative and specialized systems, the main one being the Saturn V rocket. The most powerful machine ever built, its detractors claimed it would be nothing more than a huge bomb. Yet, thanks to the efforts of thousands of engineers in various disciplines, the Saturn V successfully delivered six astronaut crews to the surface of the Moon. A mission to Mars will require even more complex solutions to crew transportation and life support problems. It is easy to dismiss these challenges as insurmountable, but to continue our advance into the unknown we have no choice but to overcome them. The Saturn V project serves as inspiration for engineers working to solve these problems today. As with any project, there will be challenges and setbacks in getting a man to the surface of Mars. An education at Cornell's Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering helps prepare students to overcome these obstacles. The school's broad curriculum helps prepare students to think outside of their engineering concentrations to find unconventional solutions. This broad knowledge base also prepares students to collaborate in the field, both with other mechanical and aerospace engineers, and with engineers from other disciplines. Cornell also prepares students specifically for the space science field with a variety of research projects. Cornell offers many research opportunities, including work with missile control surfaces and microsatellites, offering to.