Cryogenically producing oxygen-enriched liquid and/or gaseous oxygen from atmospheric air

A system for selectively isolating a liquid purified component of a gaseous mixture, the system comprising:

• a flow generator for generating a gas mixture stream;
• a cryocooler including a cooling element extending into a condensing separator;
• a heat exchanger having a first path for receiving a cold exhaust stream from the condensing separator and a second path for chilling and removing contaminants from the gas mixture stream to form a purified cold gas mixture stream via heat transfer to the cold exhaust stream;
• and
• wherein the cooling element condenses the liquid purified component from the purified cold gas mixture stream, leaving the cold gaseous exhaust stream, which exits through the first path of the heat exchanger.

A method for producing oxygen-enriched liquid from local atmospheric air, the method comprising the steps of:

• forming an input stream of the local atmospheric air;
• using cold exhaust from a closed-cycle cryogenic cooler to remove readily-condensible contaminants from the input stream to form a purified gas stream;
• and
• cryogenically cooling the purified gas stream with a closed-cycle refrigerator to condense oxygen to form the oxygen-enriched liquid.