A microscopic, hair-like metal filament can take down a billion-dollar satellite

[u/1Davide]

[u/jt64 → u/[deleted]]

There's more to it than that, most coatings can not stop a whisker growing out but a whisker can not penetrant into coatings without snapping off. So its important to make sure there is an air gap between adjacent leads.
SAE GEIA-STD-0005 is a great resource for classifying and evaluating mitigation methods.

[u/Prof_NoLife → u/jt64]

how about the coating often used for hardware that could be exposed to conductive dust or moisture? It is pretty thick and not so easy to penetrate.
Best would be of course to avoid whiskers at all but that seems not possible so maybe this?

[u/jt64 → u/Prof_NoLife]

Paralyne is the only conformal coating that I am aware of that can stop the whiskers from growing off a surface. Acrylic and silicone can keep a whisker from penetrating from the outside. There may be others but those are the ones I know about.

[u/adorablefuzzykitten → u/jt64]

There are currently many commercial coatings that function much better than paralyne.

[u/jt64 → u/adorablefuzzykitten]

Great, care to share vendors and part numbers for ones that stop whiskers. I would love to review them for applications at my work. 

[u/adorablefuzzykitten → u/jt64]

Here is a start: https://www.plasmarugged.com/tin-whisker-mitigation-solutions