Industry, research institutes and universities, such as the semiconductor industry, large-scale research facilities (GSI Darmstadt, CERN, etc.), as well as small and medium-sized companies.

ILK Dresden develops cryogenic refrigeration systems for research and industry. Depending on the application, cooling is supplied by liquid nitrogen, helium or active refrigeration systems – preferably using natural refrigerants such as air. This results in efficient solutions down to very low temperatures.

Cryogenic refrigeration systems provide very low temperatures for scientific experiments, industrial processes and highly specialised test environments. ILK Dresden develops such systems for different temperature levels and performance ranges – from applications around −100 °C to systems using liquid nitrogen or helium. Typical fields of application include cloud chambers, cryogenic reactors for the semiconductor industry, shock freezing processes, cryogenic forming, optical instruments and the cooling of superconducting components. Cooling can be supplied directly or indirectly with liquid nitrogen. LN₂ enables very low temperatures down to −196 °C and is particularly suitable when high cooling capacities must be available for short periods or when the required infrastructure already exists on site. For a cloud chamber at KIT, for example, a system was developed using LN₂ as the cooling source and a large thermal storage unit, providing up to 300 kW of cooling capacity at −60 °C for short periods. Alternatively, active refrigeration systems can be used. For many applications around −100 °C, systems based on natural refrigerants are especially attractive. In addition to conventional refrigeration machines, air-cycle refrigeration systems are becoming increasingly important, as air is a natural refrigerant and is not affected by F-gas restrictions. Temperatures as low as −160 °C are possible here. The choice of the most suitable cooling concept depends on temperature level, cooling capacity, dynamics, safety requirements and available infrastructure. ILK Dresden considers the entire process chain: thermodynamic design, selection of the refrigeration concept, heat exchanger design, control strategy, simulation, construction and experimental validation. The result is cryogenic refrigeration technology that combines high performance with safe and energy-efficient operation.