Whether it’s projecting his voice in class or offering a generous laugh after a joke, Mataan Peer (12) constantly finds himself breaking the silence.

“I think [my laugh is] a mix of the words chortle and giggle,” he said. “It’s higher pitched yet carries a sense of genuine enjoyment, as well as bestows a sense of approval on the one who made me laugh.”

Mataan loves to laugh, and he aims to make others as comfortable as he is in conversations by sharing funny stories.

“Laughter makes me know that they’re enjoying the conversation because if you’re laughing, you’re having a good time. If I’m the one making them laugh, it makes me feel really good because I enjoy being the person who’s driving the conversation,” he said. “Knowing that I can make other people smile and have a good time is satisfying.”

Mathew Mammen (10), a member of Mataan’s Electronics class, believes Mataan’s personality adds a bit of variety and excitement to lessons everyday.

“Most of the people in my class are very closed-mouthed and whisper to each other while working,” he said. “Mataan will talk out loud with his partner, and bicker with them too. He’s a very bubbly person.”

While Mataan loves connecting to others at school through jokes and silly anecdotes, many of his classmates are unaware of his interest in astronomy, a subject he strives to learn more about every day.

“I feel like a kid in the candy shop whenever people talk to me about astronomy because there’s so much about it we don’t know,” he said. “It’s one of the only sciences that has a lot of progress to be made.”

Initially uninterested in any scientific fields, Mataan first developed an enthusiasm for astronomy in elementary school when he learned about the expansiveness of the universe.

“We exist in the solar system, which exists in a galaxy, which exists in a cluster of galaxies, which exists in a supercluster of galaxies—and so on until you get to the universe,” he said. “When I first took a class and that’s what I learned, I was stricken with this intense existential crisis with the fact that I’m a tiny little human being on a tiny little planet—and that anything I do doesn’t matter.”

While Mataan has tried to share his interest in astronomy with his friends, he believes his efforts to converse with and befriend others at school have been more successful than his attempts to encourage his classmates to study astronomy.

“I’ve tried to spread the love, but it’s safe to say that I’ve been a lone astronaut so far,” he said. “Some of my friends hate it when I talk about astronomy.”

Mataan hopes to someday contribute to the scientific world by finding other habitable places in space to improve the quality of life for humans in the future.

“I’d like to be remembered for making some human-saving discovery in science,” he said. “I’d probably come up with a way to transport us all to a new planet and start over— hopefully, the people who go there will realize how much we screwed up on Earth so they can adjust how they function on their new home.”