1) what research areas are relevant, and 2) what the current understanding is along with any opposing views. It is very nice to ending with some sort of synthesis of the presented State-of-the-art to...

1) what research areas are relevant, and 2) what the current understanding is along with any opposing views. It is very nice to ending with some sort of synthesis of the presented State-of-the-art to link explicitly to the work in the proposal, especially in with regards to the following Section. This might even include a statement of what the author sees their work adding to the body of knowledge.


3.    Research Question, Aim/Objectives  and Sub-goals
What is the main research question to be solved in reaching the project goal? There can be more than one but be focused. These research questions should be very precise and almost like a requirement, be unambiguous, unique, measurable, and answerable in a meaningful way.



The objective then is basically the project goal, again clearly stated in terms of what the researcher wants to achieve, and by which means you will achieve this. This is then followed by tangible sub-goals that will be necessary to make this happen. These sub goals can then be developed into task blocks in the project plan/Gantt chart.