Cosmic Shielding demonstrated Plasteel last year in partnership with Aethero, a small-satellite maker. Cosmic Shielding is now working with the Air Force Research Laboratory to show the technology can protect military systems as well. Radiation shielding has long been a bottleneck in spacecraft design, since heavy materials add launch costs and limit payload flexibility, while rad-hard chips sacrifice performance. Cosmic Shielding received the program’s largest award: $2 million from AFRL, plus another $2 million in matching funds from existing customers. Barghouty said the company is working with DARPA, the European Space Agency and Japan’s JAXA as interest in radiation shielding grows across the space sector.