Our Partners Back to Home

Our development partners

The Space Research Centre and School of Biological Sciences in the University of Leicester are our major partners in development, and have carried out research and development under contract from BioAstral Limited.

We are collaborating with the European Space Agency to evaluate the use of superconducting tunnelling junction devises (STJs) for biological applications. Not only have we shown that STJs show the very high levels of sensitivity for measuring optical photons as astronomers have previously demonstrated for X-ray photons, but we also retain the ability to distinguish the colour of the photons detected. Through ESA we have access to a pipeline of STJ innovation and development.

Key to development of our first instrument has been the commercial availability of the first external cryogen-free cooler, which will allow us user-friendly access to the milli-Kelvin temperatures required to operate STJ detectors successfully.