Grants and Contributions

This project will advance the use of additively manufactured functionally graded materials (FGMs) for space mobility applications, focusing on liquid propulsion systems for reusable launch vehicles and spacecraft. The research is crucial for enhancing Canada's space industry capabilities and competitiveness in the global market. The project's main objectives include investigating FGM properties, optimizing additive manufacturing techniques, designing and fabricating key engine components, and conducting empirical hot fire tests to validate the improvements. Expected outcomes include improved engine performance and significantly reduced manufacturing time and costs, leading to a much more competitive space propulsion engine to commercialize on the global market. Benefits to the Canada include job creation of 30-40 highly qualified personnel hired within 5 years post-project. The project will strengthen Canada's expertise in advanced materials and manufacturing for space applications, leading to technology transfer in other sectors such as aerospace, energy, and automotive industries.

The world is striving to settle and develop the Moon. However, no one can stay there for longer than a few days without affordable ways to obtain the critical energy needed to survive the extreme cold. Volta will solve this problem beaming energy from satellites in lunar orbit to energy receivers on the surface specifically designed to work on the Moon. The first of these receivers will be developed and tested by Volta in this project, with a breakthrough technology that can ensure stability, and performance for unprecedented mission opportunities. Furthermore, Volta will send a small-scale version of its receiver to the Moon.

This project aims to enhance the communication capabilities of CubeSats—small, cost-effective satellites that are transforming space exploration, communications, and defense. While CubeSats provide affordable access to space, their future potential is limited by constrained data transmission capacity, which hampers their ability to support advanced missions. To address this, the project will develop a compact, high-performance, and cost efficient optical amplifier system to enable high-speed laser communication. With an innovative optical design, this solution will optimize size, weight, and power (SWaP), reduce costs, support large-scale manufacturing, and improve readiness for space deployment. The ultimate goal is to deliver a fully qualified optical amplifier that meets the needs of next-generation CubeSat constellations and missions. This technology will support key applications such as Earth observation, scientific research in space, remote connectivity, and defense, while also strengthening Canada’s leadership and sovereignty in advanced technology and space communications.

Rendezvous, proximity operations, and docking (RPOD) are necessary for all inter-spacecraft interactions in space. This includes in-space services such as crew & cargo transportation to the International Space Station, refueling or repairing satellites, reusable logistics, space debris removal, and beyond. Legacy RPOD systems are large, consume large amounts of power, and are extremely expensive. Obruta’s modern solution, called the RPOD Kit, is designed for modern satellites and provides virtually any spacecraft with RPOD capabilities to simplify the process of satellite servicing while making spaceflight safer. While Obruta’s autonomous flight software has been developed and tested in space, the accompanying hardware sensor components and overall system must be tested. This project focuses on the testing and validation of Obruta’s RPOD Kit to prepare it for an inaugural spaceflight mission and to reestablish Canada as a world leader in RPOD technology.

NorthStar will advance the critical capability to identify hundreds of thousands of unknown space objects by processing millions of space-based optical observations per day. Achieving this to commercial standards requires innovative adaptations of Initial Orbit Determination algorithms and massively parallel data processing pipeline methods configured in novel architectures. This project will adapt new Big Data methods to process unknown objects with a system that will scale appropriately as the NorthStar constellation expands, while still meeting latency and security requirements.

The satellite market has recently shifted towards Low Earth Orbit constellations. These missions require feeder link antennas that offer a wide scan angle and are typically supported by reflector antennas. A shift towards phased array for feeder links is starting to emerge as this technology presents great advantages in terms of number of beams, speed of reconfigurability and interference mitigation capacities. The purpose of this project is to develop a feeder link Ka-Band phased array antenna with interference mitigation capabilities. This requires developing antenna architecture and concepts that integrate on-orbit calibration and develop interference mitigation algorithms. The expected outcome will be an antenna breadboard model to support the testing of calibration and interference mitigations algorithms. LEO constellations supported by these novel feed link antennas will ultimately provide broadband access to remote areas where it is not economically viable to develop traditional broadband services, helping to close the digital divide.

With the advancement of Low-Earth Orbit Constellation missions and a higher focus towards more New Space/demonstration type missions, we believe at MDA Space that there is a real need and advantage to decrease the costs and mass of traditional solar array assemblies. To develop this technology in Canada reduces the reliance of the Canadian space sector towards American and European solar array providers. Furthermore, it would create more work on this side of the border, it would increase MDA Space’s competitiveness on the global space industry market, and it has the potential to help enable missions that weren’t closing within certain budget constraints by improving by a significant margin one of the biggest cost centers on a numerical satellite such as MDA AURORA™. More specifically, the proposed research and development work would increase the technology readiness level of a lightweight solar array comprised of a flexible substrate onto which the solar cells/modules are bonded or encapsulated, and a deployment mechanism of the type of pantograph with simple pivots and a simple cost actuator, which get validated through various breadboards and a representative prototype that undergoes environmental testing.

Quaternion Aerospace will develop a low cost, highly capable, and fully Canadian nanosatellite platform to strengthen domestic space industry capabilities and decouple from reliance on foreign suppliers. This platform will provide all of the systems needed to build a satellite, allowing Canada’s science, business, and defense industries to get their technologies into orbit quicker and at a lower cost, without any dependence on foreign countries. Quaternion will offer an off-the-shelf solution - either as individual components, or as a complete satellite bus - ready to be tailored to Canada's most pressing needs, from Artic military surveillance to detection and monitoring of wildfires, to forestry and crop monitoring. This will allow more of the money spent in these critical areas to remain in Canada, foster a strong domestic aerospace HQP pool, and accelerate the pace of innovation to ensure that Canada remains, strong, sovereign, and competitive in an ever-changing world.

CSMC is actively developing Canada’s only space Micro Modular Reactor (MMR) — the Low Enriched Uranium Nuclear Reactor (“LEUNR”) — a flagship capability to help establish Canada’s international leadership in an increasingly strategic and competitive domain for space nuclear. The proposed work seeks to validate the conceptual performance of the reactor through representative, unfueled testing on CSMC’s analog reactor, and inform CSMC’s work to raise LEUNR’s readiness from its TRL 4/5 Conceptual Design to a TRL 6 Detailed Design by the end of the project. Commercial space activities have been growing rapidly for the past decade as space agencies, militaries, and private entities race towards long-duration missions, lunar bases, and Mars exploration. CSMC’s LEUNR MMR represents a singularly compelling solution to address the renewed and urgent need to develop modular, safe, and scalable fission solutions for space.

Rocket Lab Toronto is a prime global manufacturer of new-space reaction wheels with 1500+ units sold to 70+ spacecraft manufacturing companies around the world. However, all current products are suited for satellites smaller than 400 kg and not suitable for medium-sized telecommunication missions in low-earth or higher orbits which in recent years have seen a significant increase in demand.

Through design and development of a reaction wheel with larger angular momentum capacity under this project, Rocket Lab’s Toronto division will expand its reaction wheel products reach to a much larger market and new applications. It will be able to supply the Canadian sovereign telecommunication constellation needs that are currently reliant on foreign products. Rocket Lab’s “careful COTS” low-cost approach is based on research, selection, and testing of commercial components and qualifying them for severe rocket and space environments. This project benefits Canada strategically by providing it with a sovereign product. It will also add high paying jobs and bring millions of dollars of international revenue to the country.