NPR

Young Astronaut Hopeful Gets NASA Tour Of His (Space) Dreams

Murad Rahimov got to see the inner workings of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center after an NPR listener learned of his passion for space.
Source: Melissa Block

Sixteen-year-old Murad Rahimov peered down into a gigantic space he had only dreamed about before: the world's largest clean room, kept scrupulously free of any dust or contamination, where NASA assembles and tests spacecraft before launch.

Murad's eyes gleamed and a smile played on his face as he took it all in — the scientists encased in sterile white suits; the replica of the massive new space telescope, the most powerful ever built, that will study the first galaxies born after the Big Bang.

Murad is obsessed with space. He has been ever since he was

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