Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems cryocooler overview

Development of high performance moving-coil linear compressors for space Stirling-type pulse tube cryocoolers

“…After a 50-year development since the original invention and several generations' great efforts, the PTC has already evolved from a laboratory curiosity into an enabling cryogenic technology which is efficient and reliable enough to be used on a wide variety of space missions. The past thirty years have witnessed a worldwide quest for space-qualified PTCs, and a series of successful applications since the first launch in the late 1990s have provided abundant convincing evidences of the PTC as a new-generation enabling space regenerative cryocooler [4][5][6][7][8]14,20].…”

“…Therefore, the worldwide space industry has been actively seeking means for multiyear cryogenic cooling in space to enable long-life infrared sensors since the 1950s [4,5]. In the process, two types of regenerative cryocoolers, the Stirling cryocooler and the pulse tube cryocooler (PTC) have been studied in great depth in the past three decades and had a wide range of important practical applications to date [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22]. Especially, the PTC, which eliminates any moving mechanical component at the cold end, has further achieved two evident advantages over the Stirling cryocooler: first, any wear-out at the cold end is eliminated, and second, at the cold end both vibration input and electromagnetic interference (EMI) levels are significantly reduced [23][24][25][26][27].…”

Acoustic impedance characteristics of linear compressors

“…Since being introduced for the first time in 1981 (Davey, 1981), they are often used to drive cryocoolers to ensure long-life and high-reliability (Nast et al, 2006;Raab and Tward, 2010). The operation of the linear compressor comprises complex transition processes among the electrical, mechanical, and acoustic fields.…”

Development of high frequency pulse tube cryocoolers for space applications

“…The past two decades have witnessed the rapid advancement and maturity of the high frequency pulse tube cryocooler (PTC) [1][2][3][4]. The absence of any moving mechanical component at the cold end endows the PTC several meaningful merits such as low noise, high reliability and potential long life, which have a strong appeal to the space industry [1][2][3][4].…”

“…The absence of any moving mechanical component at the cold end endows the PTC several meaningful merits such as low noise, high reliability and potential long life, which have a strong appeal to the space industry [1][2][3][4]. To date, NGAS alone has 12 high frequency PTCs currently in orbit and two of them have been in continuous operation for more than 11.5 years [4], which has proven the high frequency PTC to be an enabling cryogenic technology for space applications.…”