Staged combustion cycle

The staged combustion cycle, also called topping cycle or preburner cycle, is a thermodynamic cycle used in some bipropellant rocket engines. In staged combustion, one propellant is sent through a preburner and partially burned using a small portion of the second propellant. The resulting hot gas is used to power the engine's turbines and pumps, then injected into the main combustion chamber along with the remainder of the second propellant to complete combustion. There are two main variants of the cycle depending on which propellant is sent through the preburner: oxidizer-rich staged combustion (ORSC) and fuel-rich staged combustion (FRSC).