Cold Atom Laboratory (CAL) physicist David Aveline works in the CAL test bed, which is a replica of the CAL facility that stays on Earth. Scientists use the test bed to run tests and understand what is happening inside CAL while it is operating on the International Space Station.

The Cold Atom Laboratory launched to the space station on May 21, 2018, aboard a Northrop Grumman (formerly Orbital ATK) Cygnus spacecraft from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. Designed and built at JPL, CAL is sponsored by the International Space Station Program at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, and the Space Life and Physical Sciences Research and Applications (SLPSRA) Division of NASA's Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

More information on CAL is online at: http://coldatomlab.jpl.nasa.gov.