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US government agency NASA and Florida-based aerospace company Eta Space have launched an in-orbit liquid oxygen flight demonstration (LOXSAT) to test 11 cryogenic fluid management technologies.
Running over nine months, the work will evaluate key cryogenic handling challenges in microgravity, including boil-off reduction, propellant transfer, tank pressurisation, and in-orbit measurement of cryogenic liquids.
Data collected will be used to support the development of in-space propellant depots – or orbital “fuel stations” – designed to refuel spacecraft on future lunar and deep space missions.
Cryogenic systems are central to the programme, particularly for the storage of liquid oxygen (LOX) at around -183°C.
LOX acts as an oxidizer for liquid hydrogen (LH2), producing hydrolox propulsion, a rocket propellant system with water as its only byproduct.
Although propellant accounts for over 90% of a rocket’s lift-off weight, it typically represents less than 1% of total mission cost.
Eta Space developed LOXSAT under NASA’s Tipping Point programme, which supports technologies aimed at enabling sustained lunar operations under the Artemis programme by 2030.
In 2020, Eta Space was one of 14 US organisations awarded a combined $370m in funding to primarily develop cryogenic fluid management technologies.
The LOXSAT payload has been integrated with California-based space company Rocket Lab’s electron rocket, which will be launched to low Earth orbit from around no earlier than 17 July, at the Mahia Peninsula in New Zealand.
NASA’s LOXSAT team is composed of members of the cryogenic fluid management portfolio project, part of NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD), which develops and transfers new space technologies that benefit NASA, commercial, and other state missions.
Separately, NASA has started early testing for CryoFILL (cryogenic fluid in-situ liquefaction for landers). The project aims to use the Moon’s resources to .
