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The tokamak hall at Commonwealth Fusion Systems’ fusion energy facility in Devens, Massachusetts, will house the company’s SPARC reactor. Credit: Commonwealth Fusion Systems

How Advanced Materials Could Unleash Fusion Energy

by Prachi Patel Materials advances in the past decade have led to key breakthroughs in fusion energy. The past five years have seen the launch of numerous start-ups and a surge of investment into the long-sought clean energy source. Whether fusion becomes viable in the next decade depends on continued materials...

Infinite Helium flow path and heat diagram. Credit: Lake Shore Cryotronics

Getting Closer to Artemis II Rocket Completion with Newest Addition

NASA has integrated the Artemis II Orion stage adapter with the rest of the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket in the Vehicle Assembly Building at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Built by NASA engineers at the agency’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, the adapter connects the...

NASA Aims to Keep Fuel Cool Under Pressure with Zero Boil-Off Experiment On NG-23

Flight Engineer Joe Acaba works in the U.S. Destiny laboratory module on the International Space Station, setting up hardware for the Zero Boil-Off Tank (ZBOT) experiment. Credit: NASA Space missions rely on cryogenic fluids — extremely cold liquids like liquid hydrogen and oxygen — for both propulsion and life support...

Cryoport Opens cryogenic logistics facility near Paris

By Molly Burgesson Oct 03, 2025 Temperature-controlled supply chain solutions company Cryoport has opened a new facility in Louvres, France, with cryogenic capabilities to support the storage and transport of temperature-sensitive materials. The site was launched through subsidiary Cryoport Systems and is located near Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport. It is...

Commonwealth Fusion Systems Signs PPA with Italian Energy Company Eni

By Zachary Skidmore Google-backed nuclear fusion firm Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS) has signed a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Italian energy firm Eni for power from its ARC power plant in Chesterfield County, Virginia. In July, CFS became one of the first fusion firms to sign a PPA with a...

New Entanglement Breakthrough Links Cores of Atoms, Brings Quantum Computers Closer

Quantum entanglement — once dismissed by Albert Einstein as “spooky action at a distance” — has long captured the public imagination and puzzled even seasoned scientists. But for today’s quantum practitioners, the reality is rather more mundane: entanglement is a kind of connection between particles that is the quintessential feature...

Latest in Defining Cryogenics

Joule-Thomson Effect

The Joule-Thomson (JT) effect is a thermodynamic process that occurs when a fluid expands from high pressure to low pressure at constant enthalpy (an isenthalpic process). Such a process can be approximated in the real world by expanding a fluid from high pressure to low pressure across a valve. Under...

Current Leads

One of the challenges of using superconducting magnets is the connection of the magnet to a room temperature power supply. This is accomplished via current leads. The trick is that current leads should ideally have a low heat leak, since they connect room temperature to cryogenic temperature, while at the...

Multilayer Insulation

Multilayer insulation (also referred to as superinsulation) is a key component in the reduction of heat leak to cryogenic systems due to thermal radiation. MLI consists of a series of uncooled reflective surfaces placed in the vacuum space between two surfaces, one warmer than the other. Generally speaking, for ideal...

Latest in Cryo Central

Cryogenic Electronics

Randall Kirschman, consulting physicist, Mountain View, California ExtElect@gmail.com Cryogenic electronics—the operation of electronic devices, circuits, and systems at cryogenic temperatures—has been a valuable technology for decades. Cryogenic electronics (also referred to as low-temperature electronics, or cold electronics) can be based on semiconductive devices, on superconductive devices, or on a combination...

Particle Physics: High Energy Physics

Cryogenics and High-Energy Physics 1. From symmetry magazine: http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/cms/?pid=1000627: Cryogenics is the study of how materials behave at temperatures near absolute zero. In high-energy particle accelerators, such frigid temperatures reduce the electrical resistance of wires in superconducting magnets, increasing the magnet strength and allowing faster particle acceleration. The same holds...

HTS Degaussing Systems

From the Spring 2009 issue of Cold Facts (Volume 25, Number 2): Thanks to a joint project by the US Navy and a number of industry partners, high temperature superconducting (HTS) technology is now at the heart of an advanced degaussing system aboard the USS Higgins at the naval station...

Magnetic Resonance Imaging

From http://www.superconductors.org: An area where superconductors can perform a life-saving function is in the field of biomagnetism. Doctors need a non-invasive means of determining what’s going on inside the human body. By impinging a strong superconductor-derived magnetic field into the body, hydrogen atoms that exist in the body’s water and...

Latest in Ask the Experts

An Issue of Pressure and Flow Rate in a Supply Tank

Please help solve this problem: A supply tank requires a vaporizer to generate sufficient pressure to pump stored fluid up into a vehicle or tank. The available head is limited as the tank level falls and it is important to minimize the system pressure drop to maintain the desired flow...

Using MLI on VJ Line Joints or Cryo Storage Tanks

When installing Multi Layer Insulation (MLI) blankets on VJ line joints or cryo storage tanks should they be wrapped and tied down tight or loose? These are usually pre-cut to size. Also should they have an access hole at the point of where the molecular sieve is installed to help...

Separated layers of ice over a pipe

I want to know that why there are different layers of ice over a pipe carrying a cryogenic fluid, each layer separated with clear marks / lines? What do these layers signify?

Using nitrogen as a cryogen

Is it possible to achieve -200˚C using nitrogen as a cryogen?

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