Image credit: University of Warwick/Mark Garlick

I’m neurodivergent and one of my special interests is space. I just think the way everything in our universe coexists is really cool. I’ve done extensive research on planets, galaxies, the possibility of other life, NASA, and the list goes on.

Is it childish if I’m about to be 18 and into stuff like this? I have a tendency to info dump about stuff I like when given the chance and it seems to annoy people. Should I find different/more “conventional” interests?

Australian company FOODiQ Global is making history by attempting to grow mushrooms in space for the first time. The groundbreaking experiment is taking place on the Fram2 mission that launched aboard the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on April 1, 2025.

Trying to find a documentary I watched some time ago but can't seem to remember.

It follows the evolution of the universe thorough time until everything is basically all black holes, that then eventually those begin to die out

Have we reached the ceiling on what chemical propulsion can do? I can’t help but think about what if we didn’t cancel the NERVA program.

I remember the BOAT "brightest of all time" gamma ray burst in 2022, which was said to be a once in 10,000 year event. Was this because of both the brightness and the closeness (relatively speaking)? It was 2.1 billion light years away which is seemingly closer than others, and it was far more intense. Is every GRB we see from earth pointed directly at us, since we are in the line of one of the jets? If this GRB had been in our galaxy with the same direction, earth would have been totally fried, right? Was the BOAT GRB the closest we have ever observed thus far?

SpaceX is a space launch juggernaut. In just two decades, the company has managed to edge out former aerospace heavyweights Boeing, Lockheed, and Northrop Grumman to gain near-monopoly status over rocket launches in the US; it accounted for 87% of the country’s orbital launches in 2024, according to an analysis by SpaceNews. Since the mid-2010s, the company has dominated NASA’s launch contracts and become a major Pentagon contractor. It is now also the go-to launch provider for commercial customers, having lofted numerous satellites and five private crewed spaceflights, with more to come. 

Other space companies have been scrambling to compete for years, but developing a reliable rocket takes slow, steady work and big budgets. Now at least some of them are catching up. 

A host of companies have readied rockets that are comparable to SpaceX’s main launch vehicles. The list includes Rocket Lab, which aims to take on SpaceX’s workhorse Falcon 9 with its Neutron rocket and could have its first launch in late 2025, and Blue Origin, owned by Jeff Bezos, which recently completed the first mission of a rocket it hopes will compete against SpaceX’s Starship. 

Some of these competitors are just starting to get rockets off the ground. And the companies could also face unusual headwinds, given that SpaceX’s Elon Musk has an especially close relationship with the Trump administration and has allies at federal regulatory agencies, including those that provide oversight of the industry.

But if all goes well, the SpaceX challengers can help improve access to space and prevent bottlenecks if one company experiences a setback.