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Title: X-ray and EUV diagnostics for the Nevada Terawatt Facility: Plasma imaging, spectroscopy and polarimetry

Conference ·
OSTI ID:20050984

A wide variety of advanced extreme ultraviolet (EUV) and x-ray diagnostics ar being developed for the Nevada Terawatt Facility (NTF) at the University of Nevada, Reno. Time-resolved short-wavelength imaging, backlighting, imaging spectroscopy, and polarization spectroscopy will be employed to measure profiles of plasma temperature, density, flow, charge state, and magnetic field. These diagnostics will be used to examine the early-time evolution of a current-driven wire, the formation of a plasma sheet from the explosion and merging of wires, etc. Wire materials will include Al, Ti, W, and various coatings (e.g., Mg, Ni, Cu). Doping of local regions of wires is planned, for additional spatial resolution of the plasma profiles. The instruments are state-of-the-art applications of glass capillary converters (GCC), multilayer mirrors (MLM), and crystals. The devices include: a prototype of a new glass-capillary-based two-dimensional imaging spectrometer; a pinhole camera with 6 MCP imagers; a 5-channel crystal/MLM spectrometer (Polychromator) with fast x-ray diodes and an added transmission grating spectrometer; a convex-crystal x-ray survey spectrometer; a prototype of an x-ray polarimeter/spectrometer; and a multiframe x-pinch backlighter yielding point-protection microscopy with few-micron, sub-ns resolution. Spectroscopic data will be interpreted with state-of-the-art spectral calculations that take into account line intensity, plasma broadening, opacity, and polarization effects, for both resonance and satellite lines. Emission spectroscopy will be used to measure plasma density and temperature in the hot plasma around exploding wires, with polarization measurements helping to determine the electron distribution function and the magnetic field in this region. The density and temperature of the high-density, low-temperature plasma inside exploding Al wires will be measured with absorption spectroscopy.

Research Organization:
Univ. of Nevada, Reno, NV (US)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE; Sandia National Laboratories; National Science Foundation (NSF); US Department of Defense
OSTI ID:
20050984
Resource Relation:
Conference: 1999 IEEE International Conference on Plasma Science, Monterey, CA (US), 06/20/1999--06/24/1999; Other Information: PBD: 1999; Related Information: In: The 26th IEEE international conference on plasma science, 342 pages.
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English