National Aeronautics and Space Administration

ISAS and SHI people practicing the Low-Temperature Top Off. To fill the helium insert as full as possible before launch, we transfer liquid helium that has already been pumped down to a temperature of 1.3 Kelvin. This is a tricky operation, so we practiced at ISAS a couple of times. It'll be even trickier on the launch pad, since we'll have to work through a small hole in the rocket fairing.

Astro-E2 in the Clean Room 2004-2005 at ISAS