WASHINGTON — The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has selected the California Institute of Technology and the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign to lead the final phase of its in-space manufacturing program, the agency announced Feb. 10.
The program, dubbed NOM4D (Novel Orbital and Moon Manufacturing, Materials, and Mass-efficient Design), aims to tackle one of the most persistent challenges in space infrastructure development: how much cargo can fit inside a rocket’s nose cone.
“As commercial space companies continue to expand access to orbit for U.S. economic and national security needs, a major roadblock for building large-scale structures in orbit remains the size and weight limits imposed by a rocket’s cargo fairing,” DARPA explained in its announcement.
Caltech and UIUC will conduct small-scale orbital demonstrations to validate their novel materials and assembly processes in the space environment.
NOM4D, which kicked off in 2022, explores the use of lightweight raw materials that can be transformed and assembled once they reach orbit. DARPA says this strategy could enable the construction of structures far larger and more efficient than anything that could be launched fully assembled from Earth.
Caltech’s robotic assembly
Caltech’s demonstration, planned for February 2026, will showcase autonomous robotic construction in low-Earth orbit. The university has partnered with space transportation company Momentus to launch their experiment aboard a Vigoride orbital vehicle on a SpaceX Falcon 9 Transporter-16 mission.
The demonstration will feature a “free-flying” autonomous system where a gantry robot will construct a 1.4-meter-diameter circular truss using lightweight composite fiber tubes. While not a functional antenna, the structure will serve as a proof-of-concept for future large-scale space-based communications infrastructure.
University of Illinois’ materials process
The University of Illinois team is focusing on innovative materials and manufacturing processes. Their demonstration, scheduled for April 2026, will take place on the International Space Station using the Bishop Airlock module. The team has partnered with Voyager Technologies (formerly Voyager Space) for the mission, which will launch on NASA’s Commercial Resupply Mission NG-24.
The Illinois team’s innovation centers on a composite-forming process using carbon fiber that starts flat and transforms into a hardened reinforced structure through a controlled chemical reaction. This technology could dramatically reduce the volume needed to transport building materials to orbit.
“We envision NOM4D technologies enabling other massive structures in orbit, such as refueling stations for commercial or government spacecraft, space-based solar array farms, and many other commercial and national security applications,” said DARPA’s announcement.
A third team from the University of Florida, while not participating in the orbital demonstrations, is developing laser sheet metal bending techniques. This technology will be shared with NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, potentially contributing to future space manufacturing capabilities.
While a Department of Defense agency, DARPA has taken an interest in lunar technology development, with NOM4D complementing other initiatives like its Lunar Architecture (LunA-10) study and the Lunar Infrastructure and Robotics-Enabled Intelligence for Complex Operations (LOGIC) project.
