NIF neutron diagnostic concept based on n-p scattering from a thin CH{sub 2} converter foil
- Sandia National Labs., Albuquerque, NM (United States)
- Univ. of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM (United States)
The National Ignition Facility (NIF) is a 1.8 MJ glass laser which will initially be used to demonstrate ignition and gain in an inertially confined plasma. The present NIF target design is predicted to have a thermonuclear output of up to 10 MH for 1.8 MJ of 0.35 {micro}m laser energy incident in a hohlraum with a peak radiation drive temperature of 300 eV. These levels of thermonuclear output open up the possibility of several new classes of neutron diagnostics. One such class of instruments is based on the measurement of proton recoils from the interaction of 2.45 MeV and 14.1 MeV neutrons in thin CH{sub 2} foils. The diagnostic would operate by detecting the proton recoils at near forward angles in either time-integrated detectors or time-resolved current mode detectors. The protons may be energy resolved using range filters or by magnetic analysis in a simple dipole magnet spectrography. This diagnostic technique offers a very clean measurement of neutron yield that can be almost entirely free of scattered neutron backgrounds. At higher neutron yields, measurements of time-resolved ion temperature and reaction burn time become possible. The paper discusses several possible diagnostic configurations based on this concept and presents calculations of the sensitivity of the technique.
- Research Organization:
- Sandia National Laboratories (SNL), Albuquerque, NM, and Livermore, CA (United States)
- DOE Contract Number:
- AC04-94AL85000
- OSTI ID:
- 163097
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-950612-; ISBN 0-7803-2669-5; TRN: IM9604%%201
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 22. international conference on plasma science, Madison, WI (United States), 5-8 Jun 1995; Other Information: PBD: 1995; Related Information: Is Part Of IEEE conference record -- abstracts: 1995 IEEE international conference on plasma science; PB: 312 p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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