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As part of the Advanced Lightweight Chamber and Nozzle (ALCAN) program, over 50 hot fire tests were run in the Mojave desert over a wide range of pressures and mixture ratios in February and March. These proof-of-concept engines are designed to perhaps one day produce a booster-sized engine weighing half as much as the SSME, with increased performance. The first round of tests, conducted at Polaris Propulsion's Mojave Test Area, were intended to prove the viability of the concept, according to Rocketdyne's Program Manager Scott Claflin. In other words, we were trying to prove that we could efficiently operate a combustion chamber with a transpiration cooled ceramic matrix composite (CMC) liner Transpiration, a cooling technique in which a very small percentage of the rocket fuel flow is introduced through uniformly distributed pores in the combustion chamber wall, is similar to what happens when humans perspire.