User:Microguitarist/Evaluate an Article

Evaluate an article
This is where you will complete your article evaluation. Please use the template below to evaluate your selected article.


 * Name of article: (link) Astro Microbiology
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate.
 * I chose this article because this is the subject that I am interested in studying and having a career in.

Lead

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic?
 * Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections?
 * Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article?
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed?

Lead evaluation
The introductory sentence does clearly state what astro microbiology is. I don feel that it could be improved by possibly combining the first two sentences because both of those sentences are a more accurate introduction to the topic. It doesn't contain a brief description of the major sections in the article. It mainly focuses on the definition of astro microbiology and how it is a part of astrobiology. It does include in the last sentence the hypothesis of panspermia and incorrectly calls it a theory. The article does not include any hypotheses about how microbial life could either evolve and spread to other planets. It also touches upon the reasons that microorganisms are researched when talking about life on other planets, but does not go into why certain microorganisms, and the environments they live in, are studied. The lead I think is misleading because it is lacking in information that the article covers later and lacks the information that is mentioned in the lead later in the article.

Content

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic?
 * Is the content up-to-date?
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong?

Content evaluation
The content is relevant to the topic, however I think that some information is missing. The article includes a section of planetary exploration which is important to the topic. The next section is discoveries and it includes the unsuccessful missions as well as a table on future missions. It does not go into any of the future mission in detail, it just includes the table that briefly summarizes the missions. I don't think the article has been edited for awhile because some of those missions, when going to the mission Wikipedia pages, either have an updated launch date or ,in the case of SpaceX's Red Dragon mission, have been halted. In the introduction, the hypothesis of panspermia was mentioned but the article did not discuss that hypothesis or any other relevant hypotheses to the study. They also do not include any information about why certain microbes and their environments are studied, which they included a sentence about why microbial life is studied in relation to astrobiology in the introduction. They could have easily covered why certain environments are being studied and how they relate to Mars and the moons that are of interest to someone studying extraterrestrial microbes. They do include some experimentation that has occurred and could have included this information in this section.

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article neutral?
 * Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
 * Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented?
 * Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another?

Tone and balance evaluation
The article is written with a neutral tone. I didn't find any heavily biased opinions or claims. They do include information that about NASA's Viking program and how the results were inconclusive and some scientists still dispute them. It would have been good to elaborate on this information a bit more and why some scientists dispute the results and what they are disputing as well as the ones that don't dispute the results. The article about the actual mission doesn't state this information and keeps it very concise about what was found and why the some of the findings were inconclusive. It doesn't sway the reader's opinion. They easily could have by either having the tone of either 100 percent life exists elsewhere or no life doesn't exist elsewhere. They do a good job of keeping it neutral.

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions


 * Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information?
 * Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic?
 * Are the sources current?
 * Check a few links. Do they work?

Sources and references evaluation
They mostly link to other Wikipedia pages. If they would have elaborated on more, then they could have used more sources. They only cited 5 resources, which I think they could have found more. The links still work. It seems that their first source is what the creator of the article based it on since it follows a very similar structure. The resources all seem like they are 9 years old, so they are not very up to date.

Organization

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read?
 * Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors?
 * Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic?

Organization evaluation
The article is easy to read, clear, and concise. I couldn't find any spelling errors. They could have combined some of their shorter sentences together to shorten the lead for instance. They did use theory when they should have used hypothesis. When writing a scientific article they should know the difference between the two, especially when you go to the page of the hypothesis and it states that it is a hypothesis. The article is well organized but I think it lacks information that they could have included that is relevant to the topic.

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic?
 * Are images well-captioned?
 * Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations?
 * Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way?

Images and media evaluation
It includes a couple of images. One being a depiction of what mars would look like with water. It is labeled correctly and is in the section that talks about Mars and potential water either being on Mars previously or still existing on Mars. They did include a picture of Cyanobacteria when talking about the potential of Cyanbacteria surviving on Mars. The description on that photo is incorrect because it states that it would thrive on Mars, which isn't known to be true. They do include a diagram from an article about a protype of a bioreactor that could be placed on Mars, which is a good diagram to use to understand that topic.

Checking the talk page

 * Guiding questions


 * What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic?
 * How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects?
 * How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class?

Talk page evaluation
No conversations are currently going on the talk page. It is apart of two Wikiprojects (Astronomy and Microbiology). It is a C-rated article on both Wikiprojects however the Microbiology one rates it High importance while the Astronomy one rates a mid importance. I couldn't find any discussions on either Wikiproject pages about this article or topic.

Overall impressions

 * Guiding questions


 * What is the article's overall status?
 * What are the article's strengths?
 * How can the article be improved?
 * How would you assess the article's completeness - i.e. Is the article well-developed? Is it underdeveloped or poorly developed?

Overall evaluation
The article doesn't feel complete, it does explain what astro microbiology is clearly but I don't think it covers the topic fully. I think the article could use more information and updated information as well. It could be elaborated on to make the article more complete by filling in missing information about things that are mentioned but not talked about. There could be more on the understanding of why microbes are a good start to studying extraterrestrial life. The missions could be elaborated on more about what they are and what they are trying to study in relation to astro microbiology so that you don't have to go try to find that information on other pages.

Optional activity

 * Choose at least 1 question relevant to the article you're evaluating and leave your evaluation on the article's Talk page. Be sure to sign your feedback

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