NASA designed a metal fabric for space suits.

NASA scientists are designing metal fabrics that could one day be used for astronaut spacesuits, to  a spacecraft from meteorites, or for capturing objects on the surface of another planet. The prototypes that Raul Polit-Casillas, a systems engineer at Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, and colleagues have created look like chain mail, with small silver squares strung together. But these fabrics were not sewn by hand; instead, they were “printed,” created in one piece with advanced technologies, NASA said.

The space fabrics have four essential functions: reflectivity, passive heat management, foldability, and tensile strength. One side of the fabric reflects light, while the other absorbs it, acting as a means of thermal control. It can fold in many different ways and adapt to shapes while still being able to sustain the force of pulling on it. The researchers believe that the fabrics could also potentially be useful for large antennas and other deployable devices because the material is foldable and its shape can change quickly.